


The Man With A Thousand Jobs

by bigcaratfool



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Happy Ending, Light Angst, M/M, Mystery, there's truly a lot going on here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-01
Updated: 2019-07-05
Packaged: 2019-09-04 22:39:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 34,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16798456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bigcaratfool/pseuds/bigcaratfool
Summary: There are certain laws that control the universe. However, Joshua Hong seems to defy all logic.





	1. All Good Things Must Come To An End

Jeonghan’s hand doesn’t feel as warm as it usually does. 

Seungcheol can’t blame it on the fall weather, nor can he blame it on the business of university and the struggle to balance internships and part-time jobs. For three weeks now, his boyfriend has been off, and it’s difficult to place what exactly is wrong. Even though it’s obvious that things have changed somehow, it isn't bad; Jeonghan is still a lovely partner to have and a wonderful face to kiss on quiet nights. In fact, Jeonghan has a sort of glow to him that he didn’t have before. His laugh seems louder, his voice seems clearer, but he’s grown distant. He responds to messages and calls, but he doesn’t really seem to be completely present. He may be holding Seungcheol’s hand right now, keeping his feet on the earth, but Jeonghan’s eyes are anywhere else than Seungcheol at all times.

He knows that it’s coming. He doesn’t know why, but he has a feeling of the impending doom that he just has to accept So, he presses a kiss to Jeonghan’s temple as they walk around a local outdoor mall, and decides to wait for the other boy to open up. 

The date goes by like any other date would, with Jeonghan going into a variety of different shops that neither of them can really afford. It’s nice to pass by the colorful fall trees, the backdrop of green and oranges combined making for a lovely view of Jeonghan. The wind blows through his auburn hair with such precision it almost seems planned. Seungcheol just can’t soak in enough of that view today. He’s hardly checked his phone since the date started; He just felt the need to take in these intimate views of Jeonghan as much as he could.

The two walk into another store, and in routine fashion, Seungcheol lets Jeonghan’s hand go so he can wander around. Jeonghan does what he does best and tries on anything he’d like to see himself in. 

“Nah, I’m saving up for a perm.” Jeonghan says, taking off a tan wool coat and proceeding to naturally go back to holding Seungcheol’s hand once the coat is safely back on the hanger. 

“You’ve been saying that for at least a month,” Seungcheol chuckles. “Just do it already.” 

“You know I have to think about things for a while before I actually pull the trigger,” Jeonghan mutters, and the way that he says such normal words hurt Seungcheol in a way that he still can’t fully bring himself to comprehend. How long has he been thinking about that perm? How long has he been considering other things?

Seungcheol squeezes his boyfriend’s hand, letting him know he heard him. Usually, whenever Seungcheol would squeeze his hand like that, Jeonghan would always turn his head to give a toothy, beautiful smile. It’s the kind of smile that could light up broken streetlights and melt snowflakes, but it’s that smile that Seungcheol hasn’t seen all day. He hasn’t seen it for a while. 

“C’mon, I’m bored. Let’s get a snack.” 

Eventually the pair end up in a cafe. Jeonghan orders for Seungcheol, telling him to just go find a table. He obliges, saving a table in the far corner for the both of them and sitting at the chair against the blackboard wall. Customers have doodled all over the wall with sticks of chalk that sit in little gray buckets mounted on the wall. He thinks it’s cool that a bunch of unseen strangers gather together to make chalk masterpieces together, or that people stop their lives for a moment to just live in a little bit of creativity. He grabs a stub of chalk and decides to doodle a bit while waiting. He’s got a nagging feeling that he’s gonna he sitting here for a while, so he may as well start doing something. 

“Here, babe.” Jeonghan says, placing down Seungcheol’s drink in front of him and sitting down on the other side of the table. Jeonghan usually drags a chair to sit closer because he can’t get enough of skinship, but he stays in his place across from the little round table. There’s a pit in his stomach that begins to sink. He’s felt odd about this date since last night when Jeonghan sent him ‘I need to see you as soon as possible’ without any emojis or sexual indication. It was possibly the most obvious red flag out of the many he’d chosen to ignore for the sake of his own happiness.

“What’re you drawing?” 

Seungcheol just hums, continuing his sketch of a cartoonish looking clown. 

“You drawing me?” 

“Nah. I’d be drawing something prettier if it was you.”

Jeonghan chuckles, silky and pleasant. It’s different from his weirdly robotic chuckle that happens to he his real laugh. Seungcheol loves that stupid laugh. 

“Hey, can you stop for a second? I wanna hold your hand.” 

“You’ve been holding my hand all day.” Seungcheol rolls his eyes, feigning annoyance. 

“I’m serious this time. I want to hold your hand,” Jeonghan sucks in a startlingly long breath, “because I really need to talk to you.” 

Seungcheol swallows away the hardness in his throat and turns in his chair to face Jeonghan. He’s got his hand laid out on the table already, looking surprisingly meek and nervous. 

Here it comes. 

Seungcheol grabs Jeonghan’s hand, and leans down to the table to kiss the top of his knuckles. He rubs his thumb over the spot he’d kissed, memorizing how his soft skin feels under his rough thumb.

“I’ve found him, Cheol. My voice.”

There it is. 

“Oh…” He lets it process for a moment, sucking the words into his brain and regurgitating them until his heart hears it and begins to ache in response. “I’m… happy for you.” 

“No you’re not,” Jeonghan replies. He already looks like he wants to cry. 

“I will be.” Seungcheol forces a grin. It feels absolutely plastic.

Seungcheol knows Jeonghan has been looking forward to the day he found his soulmate for his whole life. Even before they started dating, Jeonghan just wanted to stay friends. He was one of those people that idealized soulmates, wanting to create rose-colored memories with only the person they were destined to be with. It took Seungcheol so long to get to where he was with the man now. Months of chasing Jeonghan through messages and parties to end up without a hand to hold. Months of pining and strained conversations and rethinking friendships. There were many days that Seungcheol still wishes that he could take back and rewrite history because of his hardheaded actions. When the storm cleared, and Jeonghan realized he was only a man who craved love just as much as Seungcheol, Seungcheol willingly accepted the man with open arms. They were back to being close friends without issue, only this time, they were free to fall in love without boundaries. But even in while in love, Jeonghan was so attached to that voice in his head. The man with the voice of an angel. He had always heard him singing the same song, lyrics that Jeonghan already knew by heart without ever hearing the song for himself. That was Jeonghan’s symptom, hearing his soulmate whenever he sang. His soulmate was out there, always singing for him. It was Jeonghan’s fate to be with another. Someone else was Jeonghan’s destiny.

“You’re too good to me. You always have been.” 

“If you cry, I’m gonna kick your soulmate’s ass for showing up in your life before we could have a huge, dramatic fall out.” 

“We can still have that.” Jeonghan’s eyes still look watery, but he straightens out and rips his hand from Seungcheol’s and flips his hair, beginning to whisper in a pseudo-yell. “I’m leaving you for another man!”

Seungcheol mock bangs his hand on the table. “I always knew you would! You damned incubus!” 

“Incubus,” Jeonghan giggles. “Good one. Surprised me.” 

Seungcheol finds himself staring at his glass mug of coffee, and looks over at Jeonghan’s to-go cup. He didn’t have much time left to be with Jeonghan like this.

“So, how’d it happen? Anything romantic?” 

“Kind of. I ordered a pizza, and I heard his voice start that quiet singing in my head, but then it got louder, too close to just be in my head. I ignored it like usual and just answered the door, but at the same exact moment I did that, the voice cut off. Right when he spoke, it was like microphone feedback. It pierced my ears and I pretty much doubled over because it hurt so fucking bad that I yelled, and that caused the poor guy to have the exact same reaction as I had to his voice, but that’s how I knew. The second we had both recovered, I looked over and saw the most beautiful guy I’d ever seen, even though he was wearing a pizza-patterned polo.” 

Jeonghan looks so fond as he speaks that it makes Seungcheol want to tear his heart out.

“His voice suits him. I’ve heard about it in classes my whole life, whole-body, painful reactions... It’s textbook. Everybody knows that it’s a common reaction to meeting your soulmate. After that, he started singing that song, and I knew the words. I almost felt like crying, but the other guy did that for me. I spent like, ten minutes trying to get him to stop.” 

Ah. The song. The song that’s tortured Jeonghan since he developed the spirit-connection. It always seems to bother him, especially when they are out on a date. It’s worse when they would make out or get a mood going, and his soulmate would start singing. It killed the mood every time. Jeonghan could never recover from that, no matter what Seungcheol did. It often made him feel like a useless boyfriend.

“What’s his name?” 

“Seokmin. He’s really nice over text, but I haven’t gone out or anything with him because, well…” 

Seungcheol nods. “Ah, I get it. I’m in the way.”

“Well, don’t say it like that, it makes me feel like an asshole.” 

“You’re not. We have a plan for this already, yeah?” 

Jeonghan inhales again, labored and painful for Seungcheol to listen to.

“Yeah.” 

Seungcheol can’t help but tear up, because in the nine months he’s been dating Jeonghan, and the four months prior that he battled Jeonghan’s morals, he’s truly felt love for him. He was in love. 

“Well, I guess I just... gotta let you go, right?”

“I loved you, Cheol. I still do, even right now.” 

That makes Seungcheol break, because it really feels like his world is going to start crashing down, and he can’t even do anything about. He knows he has to respect this. It’s one of the fundamental laws of the universe. Fighting against fate is futile. He props his elbows up on the table and hides his face behind his fists, looking down at his own lap. He lets a few tears fall without so much as a snivel or a quiver. 

“You’re always going to be my first real boyfriend. Thank you.” 

Seungcheol wipes his cold tears, takes a deep breath, and looks up with a smile. 

“Thanks to you too, for letting me be in your life the way I selfishly wanted to be.” 

“Don’t say that, I wanted you just as much. I was just...” 

“I know, I know.” Seungcheol feels like he’s having the hardest time keeping his composure. It hurts. His chest feels like it's being steadily pushed on, like a boxing glove being slowly mashed into his chest with a hydraulic press. It’s hard to end something that’s been nothing but beautiful and positive. It’s worse to let go of something he wasn’t ready to set free. “You should go set up a date or something.” 

“I need time to get over you.” Jeonghan says softly. “I’m still in love with you, soulmate or not.” 

“Don’t keep him waiting too long though, yeah? We need to just end it here.” 

Jeonghan sniffles and stands with his arms outstretched. Seungcheol immediately follows suit and buries Jeonghan’s head into his shoulder. 

“We agreed to be friends if this was the outcome. Do you still want to do that?” Seungcheol forces himself to talk despite how heavy his voice feels, how labored every syllable forces past his lips is. 

Jeonghan only nods, sniffling again. Seungcheol takes the opportunity to close his eyes and savor the moment, even if they’re in public. This is the last time he’ll hold Jeonghan again as his lover. 

“I love you so much, Han. Thank you.” 

Neither of them move to pull away for a while. The clattering of cups against glass plates feels too loud, and the quiet buzz of jazz is just overkill, but Seungcheol can’t bring himself to move away. 

Jeonghan pulls away first, and Seungcheol immediately feels the loss. The entire mass of warmth against him, evaporating in a second, making the comfortable cafe feel so, so cold. 

“I should go,” Jeonghan says softly, as if if he were to speak too loud, his voice would shatter and he’d collapse into pieces like a crumbling church’s stained glass windows.

Seungcheol nods, lets the other move away from his grasp. There’s nothing else that needs to be said. They’ll talk to each other when they’re ready to be friends again, and Seungcheol’s fine with that. He knew this would happen someday, he just selfishly wished that it wouldn’t happen for a while.

He’d heard it many times in classes. One cannot fight the will of fate. Delayed it might become it cannot be stopped. It’s a fact that fate is undeniable. There is a purpose for soulmates, and there is a reason they exist. Science may not have unlocked all of the truths behind it, but there is no way around it. It exists for the good and the happiness of humanity. In moments like this, Seungcheol is left wondering what “good” it really does.

Jeonghan turns to leave, and Seungcheol sits back down in his chair, face turned upwards to the ceiling and breathing as deeply as he can to calm himself down.

Jeonghan, so cautious of love, but so handsome a man, loved Seungcheol in return because Seungcheol simply wished him to. He sometimes felt like he had forced the relationship upon the other, but Jeonghan still let it happen. He held Seungcheol’s hands on good days, wiped his tears away on bad days, and laughed and bickered and enjoyed every moment with him. Jeonghan always joked about his angelic looks, but Seungcheol would like to believe that Jeonghan really was an angel walking the earth. His soulmate was one lucky bastard.

Throat still heavy, he looks down and back over to that clown he doodled. He picks back up the stub of chalk and writes a small “me” next to that silly looking little clown. That’s how he feels, at least.

The soft jazz song fades into a more somber sounding song, violins slowly singing together in a sad melody. The bows of the violins act like sledgehammers that work to shatter Seungcheol’s fragile front, and he really does start to cry. He hangs his head behind his fists once more and lets his tears flow freely, stifling sniffles with gross coughs when he can.

Within a minute, the song changes to some Lo-Fi playlist, but Seungcheol’s still left struggling to keep himself together. He feels absolutely pathetic crying in public like this; it’s something he’s never done before. 

“Um, hey,” a timid voice says, too close for Seungcheol’s fragile state of mind. He jolts and makes quick work of drying his tears with his coat sleeve, clearing his throat. He looks up, trying to play it like he wasn’t just full-on crying in a cafe, to see a concerned employee. Judging by the apron, he’ll take a wild guess that it’s a barista that probably saw the whole thing. 

“I changed the song. I noticed you looked really sad so I thought it’d help out a little.” The barista grins, catlike eyes lifting upwards with the tilt of his lips. “Your coffee looks like it’s gone cold. I can get you another one on the house.” 

“It’s fine,” Seungcheol speaks, thoroughly embarrassed and honestly ready to just go continue his moping in his car. “Thanks.” 

“Erm... Can I sit with you? I’m about to go on my break, so…” 

“Oh. Okay.” 

He has no idea why he agreed - the words kind of just popped right out of his mouth - but he can’t take it back because the barista already turned on his heels and walked away. He runs a hand through his hair and sighs, because he really is stuck here now. The man returns without his apron a mere moment later and sits in the same spot Jeonghan did not even ten minutes ago. 

Seungcheol drills holes into the table with his eyes, not saying a word. What the hell would he say to a stranger, anyways? 

“Uh… So... I saw what happened.” 

“Great, I’m sure the whole cafe did too,” Seungcheol mumbles, but right after he does, he kind of feels like a dick. “Sorry, I’m...” 

“It’s cool, I get it.” The barista smiles and scratches at his ear, brushing his ash-brown hair away from it, and goes on to play with a piercing. Helix, it seems. Seungcheol touches at one of his own piercings, like habit. 

“I think it’s rad that you have the emotional vulnerability to cry in public. You don’t see that often.” 

“Huh. You don’t hear ‘rad’ and ‘emotional vulnerability’ in the same sentence too often.” 

“Got me there.” The barista raises his hands with a small smile. “Can I ask what happened?”

“My b-” Seungcheol coughs into his hand. “My ex just found his soulmate, so…”

“Ah.” The barista nods, like he understands how it feels or some empathetic bullshit that Seungcheol doesn’t know if he wants right now. “You mind if I talk your ear off for a while?” 

Yes. Definitely. Please leave me alone. 

“I guess not.”

That’s not what I wanted to say at all.

“Neat.” 

Neat? Seungcheol snorts and crosses his arms, getting himself ready to listen for a while.

The barista crosses his legs, getting himself comfortable in the decorative iron chair. He folds his hands and takes in a breath, and suddenly Seungcheol feels like he’s in an interview or some sort of equally important conversation. The easygoing bustle of the cafe no longer feels overwhelming now that his focus isn’t on his own sorrow.

“When I had my first breakup, my grandma told me something that I carry with me all the time. She told me that love gives us courage, but the loss of it gives us unimaginable strength. Every time you truly love, and every time you lose it, it makes you a better person. Just now, you’ve become a better person, and as you get over that pain you’ll advance to be even more admirable.” 

“Better person, huh?” Seungcheol mumbles. He’s been through breakups before, so this feeling isn’t really anything new to him, but it always does hurt a ton more than he ever thought it would whenever he does foolishly nosedive into a relationship.

“Yeah. Seeing how you took it so well, I can tell you’re already a good person. You must’ve loved a lot in the past, right? That’s admirable, considering the system the universe works on.”

“I don’t really care for the whole soulmate system. I think that people should be able to love who they want to love. Wasting your days waiting on someone that you might never find.. I don’t know. I’d rather take fate into my own hands.”

“Oh? Taking fate into your own hands?” The barista’s soft brown eyes sparkle with interest. “That’s not too common to hear these days. You sound like a movie protagonist. What’s your name?”

“Seungcheol.” 

“You really don’t care about soulmates?”

“Mm, not really. Why?” 

“It just honestly fascinates me. I major in psychology, and love sciences interest me the most. The philosophy and sociology behind love and soulmates is, like, awesome, but it’s outliers that reject the system that interest me the most.” 

“Ah, got it. Psychology major. That’s why you’re so nosy.” 

“I’m not nosy!” The barista takes on a bashful expression, his roundish nose tinting pink in a way that makes Seungcheol grin. “I just... I don’t know. What else can I do besides people watch when I’m not making drinks? I guess I got kind of worried because you looked really upset.” 

“Well, I appreciate your concern. I don’t really feel like crying anymore. Tell your grandma she’s a smart woman. She raised a kind grandson.” 

“Wow… You talk like a dad.” 

Now, it’s Seungcheol’s turn to feel embarrassed. The barista chuckles, high-toned and breathy. Seungcheol instinctively scrunches his shoulders. 

“Ew, please don’t call me that.”

“The next time you come in, I’m going to write ‘DAD’ on your cup, and you’ll have to do the walk of shame up to me.” 

That gets a rise out of Seungcheol, and a laugh blooms in his chest, rather than the heavy weight he’d been feeling all the while. 

The barista’s phone alarm rings, and he immediately stands. 

“I’m glad to see you’re feeling better! I’ve got to get back to work. See you then, Seungcheol.”

“Yeah, see you.”

Seungcheol doesn’t see that barista again, not when he comes a few days later, and not when he visits a few times the next week. It’s as if the barista just vanished into thin air, like he had never existed in the first place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welcome! this au is based off of a twitter post by @leaderunits on twitter! (link below)
> 
> https://twitter.com/leaderunits/status/1066904964658692096
> 
> it's funny but this little shitpost gave me an idea that i. could just. not. knock. out. of. my. brain. i sincerely hope you guys enjoy the ride i've planned ahead!! i think that going ahead there will be some questions so if you ever have any, just let me know!! :D
> 
> thank you to my best friend for beta-ing this fic i owe you not only my life but the lives of Millions!!!!!!!!!!!


	2. A Convenience Store Coincidence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not even fate can stand between a drunk man and his Cheetos.

The ambiance of the trendy bar makes Seungcheol feel more… alive. 

His friends are a blast, especially with Soonyoung unintentionally forcing the place into a disco karaoke night. All Soonyoung did was get a little tipsy and start to sing along to the music playing, and Seungkwan was all too eager to follow his lead. The owner overheard them (frankly, it was impossible not to) and whipped out the microphones and the stupid lights. It was truly all downhill from there. All hell broke loose when Seungkwan decided that Abba would be an excellent edition to the night. A supposed heterosexual safehouse was soon destroyed by a flagrantly gay playlist and a crowd of revelrous college kids looking for a fun night. 

Seungcheol wouldn’t trade these moments for anything. Soonyoung standing atop a table, tits out and yelling along to “Gimmie! Gimmie! Gimmie!” Jumping with friends and strangers alike, and singing— although one could say it’s more akin to screaming— until his voice was hoarse, made his semester stressed and his broken-heartedness drown with the alcohol in his system. 

Common for nights like these, Seungkwan, Soonyoung, and Mingyu accompany him. Seungkwan and Soonyoung love to cause a ruckus, and Mingyu just likes going anywhere he can get absolutely smashed. Seungcheol sits in the middle of the spectrum, wanting an equilibrium of a good time and good alcohol, but also wanting to remember his night. 

Being the friend-crowned “dad friend,” he’s the one that wants to go home first. His friends, as per usual, aren’t quite ready to tap out. 

“Stay out a little longer!” Mingyu throws an arm around Seungcheol, whining, “I’m out here, trying to be a good wingman, and you haven’t spoken to anyone besides The Squad!” 

“Since when were we The Squad?” Seungcheol laughs, lightly trying to pry his friend off. “Plus, I don’t need anybody right now. I have you guys.” 

“That’s the saddest thing I have ever heard.” Mingyu places a hand over his heart. “You don’t see anyone that’s cute?” 

Seungcheol takes a moment to scan the crowd with his eyes. There’s plenty of attractive people, sure, but most people are already in groups. He’d rather not cut into anyone’s night. 

“Really, there’s nobody, and I just wanna fuckin’… Fuckin’ sleep.” 

Mingyu rolls his eyes and waves over the bartender. 

“One more beer and a song, and we’ll let you go.” 

Seungcheol agrees because he doesn’t really have a choice. After screeching through one last song, he leaves his friends with a hug and a promise to get home safely. Seungkwan pitches in towards his uber, and before his brain has caught up with him, he’s in the backseat of an elderly woman’s car. 

“Hey, would you mind stopping here?” Seungcheol asks, pointing at a gas station convenience store. Thankfully, the woman complies. It’s only about a block from his apartment, and the cold just sounds refreshing. Plus, he really wants some goddamn cheetos. 

He’s been here a thousand times. He knows with his heart that his favorite canned coffee is in the leftmost freezer on the fourth shelf. He knows with his eyes closed where the chips and candies display is without pounding an elbow off. He also knows with his left nut where the condoms are. 

So when he turns the corner to see a young looking guy with light blonde hair, it catches him off guard. Seungcheol stares hard, feeling some sort of familiarity to him, but he just can’t place where. 

Helix, upper helix, and daith piercings. A smooth and rounded profile, with gentle sloping eyes and naturally grinning lips. Seungcheol’s mind races as much as it can in an inebriated state, trying to place a name to the face. 

He feels as if he may have seen him before at the local mall, perhaps inside of a… few different stores? Maybe he saw him at Disneyland as he was boarding The Haunted Mansion with Chan? Or was it in his campus library, or the gym, or the movie theater, or a Taco Bell? Was it a Mcdonald’s? Was he the guy he gave his dry cleaning laundry to? He thinks he might have seen him selling Ice Cream at a park. Or was he selling bananas at a farmer’s market? 

It’s odd. Seungcheol feels like he can picture this guy in any uniform. His face is so familiar, a sense of deja vu rattling throughout his whole body. The man lazily turns forward, and like a lightning bolt striking his mind, he knows. 

“Barista boy!” Seungcheol snaps, pointing at the man. 

He looks wildly confused, a stock box of candy in hand, probably prepped to fend Seungcheol off with Kit Kats.

“You watched me get dumped at Flower Cafe! I came back to get my ‘dad’ drink, you know.” 

Seungcheol leans onto an aisle shelf with an elbow, but the bags of chips that crunch beneath it ruin the smoothness of the action. He cracks a gummy smile as if it works as an apology.

The barista-turned-7/11 employee stares at Seungcheol, like he’s trying to decipher his whole being, and then smiles back. It doesn’t look like a real smile, though. There’s a slight strain in the man’s brow that gives it away. 

“Oh, goodness. How could I forget..?” He adjusts the box under an arm and asks, tentatively, “How do you remember that?”

“You’ve got a memorable face. Oh, you dyed your hair! When did you start working here? Heather would’ve told me if she hired someone!”

The man’s gaze shifts behind Seungcheol and back towards the front counter. Curious, Seungcheol looks, turning his whole body to see. 

An older man stands before Heather, the woman who’s been working there the longest, and points out the brand of cigarettes he needs. The man’s gruff voice is barely a whisper louder than the dying speakers of the store, but Seungcheol can tell how sweetly the man is speaking by the way he grinned through his words. Heather’s exhausted face, always wrinkled and somewhat gloomy, seemed to light up as she spoke to the man. The glimmer in her hazel eyes shone brighter than ever as the man wrote something down on a piece of paper and handed it to her. Heather kissed the paper, and Seungcheol felt his own heart loop in his chest. He turns back around, satisfied with his invasion of privacy. The man, still staring at the two, now wears a genuine and dorky little smile on his face. 

Seungcheol’s eyes wander about. The nametag read “Joshua” with a little sticker that a label maker would produce.

“Sorry...” Joshua seemingly comes back to it, looking at Seungcheol. His eyes snap upwards. “What were we talking about?”

Seungcheol wracks through his brain. All he can really think about is that Joshua is extremely pretty, even in the washed out lighting of the 7/11.

“Er... I need… I need cheetos.” 

“Oh. Just, um…” Joshua looks around, eyes scanning through the shelves as if he’d never looked at them before. 

“They’re right here.” Seungcheol says, reaching past Joshua-- who leans backwards to avoid contact-- to grab the bag of the sacred snack. 

“Oh. Right. Um.. Is there anything else I can help you with?” 

With another look that lasts far too long, Seungcheol decides to dip out. 

“No. Have a nice night.” 

Seungcheol turns and shuffles over to the front counter to pester Heather about that man, and she blushes and jokes with Seungcheol about kicking him out of the store. 

“Oh, by the way. Who’s the new employee?” 

Heather raises a brow, “Who?” 

Seungcheol blinks, unsure if he’s drunk enough to be misunderstood. 

“You know, the blonde guy. Uh, Joshua, I think.” 

Heather’s eyes seem to gloss over, as if her mind had flown into the cosmos and she was just watching it go. 

“Oh, Joshua. I’m pretty sure he’s always been working here.” 

There’s a weird, icy feeling running in Seungcheol’s blood, but he ignores it in favor of grabbing his change and his cheetos and heading home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here's a lil' snack sized update, because i really wanted to update this but also it's exam time so if i put any more time into this i would be an absolute grade A buffoon. 
> 
> enjoy!


	3. Diner Dash

Mingyu, absolutely hyped up on adrenaline and alcohol, is almost unbearably loud. It’s not hard to picture a 6 foot something megalith of a man being loud, but Mingyu isn’t just loud. He’s whiny. He had ran his voice hoarse watching an intense game of ice hockey, and now all he can do is whine in the most aggravating, high toned voice possible. And Seungcheol has to be the one to take care of him because he’s a good friend. Mingyu also paid for the tickets, so Seungcheol also owes about ten very large favors to him.

“I’m huuungry,” Mingyu groans, flopping about in the passenger seat of his car like an actual child. 

“You’re broke now,” Seungcheol says, flat, his own voice a little horse. He thinks about his own bank account, struggling from all of the overpriced stadium beers he had bought for Mingyu. “I’m broke now. Where can we even eat that won’t put us into crippling debt?”

“I want breakfast, brooo!” Mingyu’s pathetic, worn out voice can hardy handle the sing-song he tries to manage. It cracks midway through the sentence, making Seungcheol cringe. 

Breakfast at night isn’t usually an easily accessible or cheap request, so that leaves Seungcheol with incredibly limited options on where to take them. With Mingyu howling along to the radio, it just makes Seungcheol wish that he were the same level as shitfaced so that somebody else would have to deal with using the community brain cell. Since it’s his current job, though, he pulls into a cheap diner.

America’s Favorite Diner, the slogan reads, and Seungcheol is oddly amused by it. Every single damn time he’s been to Denny’s, it’s because he’s shitfaced and it’s 3 am, his friends are hungover and it’s 3pm, or his paycheck hasn’t hit and the discount menu has become the poor man’s gospel. And currently, he’s feeling really religious. 

“I want the slam dunk,” Mingyu says, looking down at his phone and re-watching highlights of the game.

“The Grand Slam?”

“It’s so sexy how you just get me, Cheollie.” 

Seungcheol is so disgusted that he can’t even hold back the visceral gagging Mingyu had cursed him with. 

“Okay, I’m just gonna get it as take-out. Stay here.”  
He decides Mingyu is a big enough boy to lock the car and sit there by himself, so he hops out of the car without pulling the keys from the ignition and braces the cold for a full ten seconds as he makes his way to the fake frosted glass doors of the diner. 

After ordering enough food for Mingyu’s absurdly large appetite, he decides to wait and sit at the bar, the stool making an ugly screech against the metal every time he turns, causing Seungcheol to debate if he needs to lose weight or not. He stares at his fingers, as if they’re a good indication of weight gain, until he gets bored with that. When he looks up, he sees a familiar face again. 

“Oh, Joshua?” He doesn’t mean to speak out loud, but he does, and the boy turns. He’s got pink hair now, and it’s honestly the cutest thing that Seungcheol has ever seen. He’d swoon if it didn’t look like Joshua was about to bust into a sweat. 

“So, you work here now?” 

“Uh, yeah... 7/11 isn’t enough to pay the rent!” Joshua smiles, but it doesn’t quite seem to carry upwards to his eyes. “Uh, do you... live around here? Just wondering.”

“Nah, my buddy Mingyu does. We went to see a hockey game together today.”

“Ah... Cool… Um… I’ll go check on your order-” 

“No, wait.” 

Joshua wordlessly turns on his heels, one hand already pushing open the door to the kitchen, and Seungcheol wracks his brain for something, literally anything. 

“I, uh, wanted to ask you where you got your piercings. I’ve been meaning to get some more, and I really like the placement of yours.” 

“Oh... I don’t remember, sorry.” 

With that, Joshua disappears back into the kitchen, and Seungcheol is left sitting there, feeling more awkward than he has in literal years. Since when did he completely lose all of his social skills? 

“You’re... leaving me?” A woman says, hushed. 

It interrupts Seungcheol’s train of thought, and he suddenly feeling very nosy. He looks upwards at the television, which just so happens to be turned off. In the reflection of the darkened screen, he can see a couple sitting just behind him at a booth. The man is leaning out of his seat and over the table, whispering in an attempt for their conversation not to be heard. It’s entirely futile, with how upset the woman already looks.

“I... I’ve fallen for someone. Listen, Lauren, we knew this wouldn’t be forever-” a male voice says, sweetness dripping from every syllable. 

“No!” She raises her voice. “It doesn’t have to end like this. Please. I need you,” she extends her leg to brush against the other’s, “and you need me.” 

“This is different, baby. We have to cut this out before she finds us.” 

“How is this any different than any other woman?”

“She’s my soulmate, babe. I saw it last night. On the nape of her neck... She has the same mark as I do.” 

The woman sits in stunned silence. The air around the both of them is stiff for a while, and suddenly, the man stands.

“I’m sorry, Lauren. Don’t call me anymore. This is the rest of my life. I hope that you find yours soon.” 

Seungcheol exhales out a breath he wasn’t even aware he was holding. He looks down from the television’s reflection, and he sees Joshua’s face poking out from the kitchen window, eyes fixated on that booth. It doesn’t look like Joshua really knows how to be discreet. Seungcheol snorts, and when Joshua’s head snaps in his direction, Seungcheol hides his face in his arm and gives a few fake coughs. 

After a few more minutes, Joshua comes out with a large bag of food and a receipt. 

“Is there anything else I can get for you?” he asks, his gentle voice sounding a bit less pleasant than usual. Cold, somehow, just barely holding himself back from spitting out the words. Seungcheol doesn’t really know what he did, but he figures he should just take the bag and leave, so he does. He makes sure to smile at Joshua as he leaves, and again, the smile that he gets in return doesn’t look entirely convincing. Even so, it’s pretty, and it takes a few seconds too long for Seungcheol to turn away and leave. 

“You missed a full on prime-time drama in there,” Seungcheol says as he slips back into the front seat of the car, and Mingyu doesn’t even look up from his phone. He just holds out his hand for the bag, and Seungcheol complies by giving it to him.

“What happened?”

“Guy was breaking up with his mistress because he found out the other girl was his soulmate.” 

“What a dick.” Mingyu spits out. “I hate guys like that.” 

“You’re kind of that guy.” 

“Not even!” Mingyu looks genuinely hurt, and Seungcheol finds it funny how he has the capacity to look hurt as he shoves a quarter of his plate of hash browns into his mouth. He swallows before talking again. “I never cheat. I always date one at a time. Jackass.”

“You kind of blow through em’ quick though.” 

“What can I say? I’m loveable.” 

Seungcheol rolls his eyes and sits back in his chair, deciding to just let Mingyu eat. He doesn’t want Mingyu’s drunk ass to spill something all over the car, because somehow, it would be Seungcheol’s fault in the end. 

For a few minutes, he gets lost in his thoughts as he lets his friend chow down, the younger making happy little noises with each bite he takes. 

“When Jeonghan and I split up, there was this barista who offered me a free drink to help me feel better. Really nice guy, actually.” 

Mingyu hums acknowledgingly,

“He works here now. He’s got pink hair at the moment. You should see him, he’s actually pretty cute.”

Mingyu slows to a stop, and Seungcheol doesn’t even want to look. He just knows that the younger has some sort of disgusting grin on his face. 

“How cute is ‘cute’?”

“What- What kind of question is that?”

“Is he, like, I should get his number for you kind of cute?” 

“Oh, definitely the fuck not.” Seungcheol reaches to turn the keys to turn the car back on, but before he can successfully reach them, Mingyu stabs his hand with his fork. 

“Ow!” He yells, shooting Mingyu a glare.   
“Get his number.” 

“I already said no.”

“You said that I couldn’t get his number for you, so you have to do it.”

“What if I don’t want his number?” 

“Okay, then I’ll get it for myself.”

“Your drunk ass is not leaving this car. No way in hell.” 

Mingyu huffs, frustrated. 

“You’ve been a downer ever since Jeonghan dumped you. You need to get over it.” 

“You can’t just get over a year long relationship, Mingyu!”

“That’s literally what a rebound is for!” 

“You’re a piece of shit.” 

“I’m telling you, it works. I’m not wrong. Look,” Mingyu adjusts in his seat to face Seungcheol, waving his plastic fork around like it helps him talk. “I’m not saying you have to date the guy or anything, but getting his number might help you get some of that old sexy Seungcheol confidence back. You used to be so fucking cool, dude.” 

“Used to be? I’m still cool.” 

“No, you’re not. You sit at home watching prime-time dramas.” 

“You watch them with me!” 

“That’s besides the point!” 

Seungcheol crosses his arms and raises an eyebrow, waiting for Mingyu to elaborate. 

“You’ve been in a weird funk ever since then, is all I’m trying to say. You’re a cool guy, Seungcheol. Just go for it. What’s the worst that can happen? You don’t get his number? Just do it!” 

Mingyu’s eyes glisten with pride as if he’d given the best Ted-Talk to exist, even though he didn’t talk for more than thirty seconds. 

“Will you give me some of your eggs if I go in and ask?”

“Deal.” Mingyu winks, and with a swing of his fork, he dives back in.

Seungcheol inhales deeply and gets back out of the car, and he fleetingly wishes he had half of Mingyu’s drunken chutzpah. Upon walking back in, Joshua is wiping down wet mugs behind the bartop. 

“Hey, actually, I have a question.” 

“Oh, was there something wrong with your order?” Joshua asks attentively, setting down the mug and throwing the rag under the table. 

“No, actually, um…” He chokes up, and for some reason, he just can’t get the words out. Suddenly, Mingyu’s annoyingly raspy voice comes back into his mind. Just do it. 

“Is it okay if I ask for your number?” 

Joshua’s polite grin falls, and his brows knit together slightly, and Seungcheol can only hear sirens because he’s going to panic. 

“I just- you know- I keep running into you, and I think you’re a really nice guy and I think it would be cool to talk to you a bit more, if you’d give me the chance? Uh-” 

Before Seungcheol can choke out anything else, Joshua pushes through the little waist-high bar entrance, and makes a run for it, straight out of the diner. Seungcheol can hardly believe it, because the man just straight up ran out of his job. He quickly figures he has to fix things, so he decides to book it, too. He makes it out of the doors just mere seconds after Joshua does, the poor bells not having a chance to break from their jingling after the other’s hasty exist. Mingyu is pointing frantically to the left, and Seungcheol’s legs carry him that direction until he has a chance to think about how absolutely insane this is. 

Joshua runs into a small liquor store, the door slamming behind him, and Seungcheol’s fingers just barely graze the knob of the pull door. He opens it, only to see an absolutely empty store, and an extremely startled cashier. 

“Have you seen a pink-haired Denny’s employee run through here?” Seungcheol breathes out. 

“N-No? You’re the only person I’ve seen come here today!” The cashier’s hands come up in defense, and Seungcheol puts his face in his hands. 

“Can I get you anything? We’re having a sale on locally made wines-”

“I’m good, thanks.”

The walk of shame to the car is bad enough, but when Seungcheol flings the car door open, Mingyu’s uproarious laughter is even worse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for takin so damn long last week was exams week and i had to go into a four day coma before emerging from my cave and deciding to do something with myself!!! i hope this chapter made u laugh pls enjoy <3


	4. Hook, Line & Sinker

Seungcheol returns from the bathroom to find Chan curled up on a cute eel-themed bench, holding onto it for dear life as he gasps through a fit of laughter. Soonyoung is patting his back, but even he looks like his brain has left the building, red-faced and laughing. Across from them on a similar bench is Mingyu and Seungkwan, Seungkwan’s gross cackles making his body convulse like he’s about to cry. 

Seungcheol locks eyes with Mingyu, and he immediately  _ knows  _ what the younger just did. 

“We  _ agreed _ ,” He spits with embarrassment fueled rage, “to not talk about that.” 

Mingyu’s hands come up defensively, and he puffs up his cheeks to hide his smile. 

“So you’re saying-” Chan gasps for air again, “that the poor dude ran?”

“For his  _ life _ , man.” It feels like time slows down, and through Seungcheol’s tunnel vision of pure torture, it’s like every syllable is leaving Mingyu’s mouth more deliberately as he says, “He ran like he’d never be able to use his legs again.”

Seungcheol groans, suddenly wishing that he hadn’t agreed to go with his friends to the aquarium today. He thought it’d be nice to spend some time with his mates because, in a way, Mingyu was right. Seungcheol just needed to get over his emotional distress that he’d been silently stewing over, and he’s been only pretending like he’s fine for too long now. Instead of fully taking his friend’s shitty drunk advise, he decided to spend more time with the people he cared about rather than finding someone new to add to his already big enough list of people he loves.

Currently, he doesn’t love any of these goddamn fools. The cacophony of laughter is bringing down his ego rapidly. All he really wants to do now is shove Seungkwan out of the way and wring out Mingyu’s thick neck until he chokes, but he knows that no acts of violence against Mingyu is going to fly as long as Seungkwan is around. For reasons unspoken, only Seungkwan is allowed to physically mess with Mingyu. 

“You know what? I’m going to look at the fish. We came here to do that. Not to gossip,” Seungcheol says, turning on his heels. 

“Nooo! Come back you big baby!” Seungkwan cries out dramatically, but it’s no use. Seungcheol has already fixated on his idea of getting away from his friends before they verbally decimate him. They’re going to do it anyways, but he’d rather not have to hear it. He can imagine it already; they’re going to start calling every failed pick-up attempt “pulling a Cheol”. 

It’s probably a good thing for his friends’ lives that aquariums have such a calming aura. Ignoring all of the educational decorations, it’s just nice to separate from reality and look at pretty animals. Plus, the deep purple and blue hues from the broad tanks that reflect off of every surface feels otherworldly. It’s a nice escape from reality.

He walks until he comes across the section of the aquarium where there’s a curving walkway through a bunch of tall tanks, schools of fish swimming around. Seungcheol stares at a group of shiny silver fish for a while, and it relaxes him even further. Eventually, he can see employees feeding the fish through the top of the tanks, and Seungcheol guesses there’s probably a second floor that they do that at. He gets lost in the idea of the type of people who might work here; probably calm types who just really like fish. He wonders if he’d be a good fit, because he is absolutely over it with his current job.

As he ponders these thoughts, a couple walks by. He moves away a little bit from the middle of the pathway, and he can hear them muttering sweet words to each other. They stop right smack in the middle of the walkway, and eventually the girl gets down on one knee, proposing to her girlfriend. The other girl begins to cry rather loudly, proclaiming how happy she is, and agreeing to marry.

Seungcheol sees this out of the corner of his eye, smiles to himself, and decides that he should give the two privacy. At the end of the walkway, he sees the shadow of someone just  _ watching  _ their proposal, hands on the rounded corner of the tank and everything. 

_ Creep _ , he thinks, but as he gets closer the shadow becomes less dark and looks more and more familiar until he realizes.

_ It’s fucking Joshua.  _

He’d recognize those gentle eyes anywhere. They widen with shock as they spot Seungcheol coming, but Joshua doesn’t move at all, almost as if frozen in place. 

Seungcheol moves past the corner as fast as he can without breaking into a jog, embarrassed that he’s run into him again after what happened a week ago. He’d been hoping that he’d never run into him again, but it seems that he’s just got bad luck. 

He walks around the aquarium for a while, through smaller tanks with dangerous fish, the manta ray pools, the jellyfish enclosure, the turtles and the weird little ice cream parlor near the gift shop, but for the life of him he can’t find the sitting area near the eels where he had initially left his friends. So as much as he doesn’t want to, he has to pass through where he saw Joshua, but he’s not there anymore. 

When he does find the group, he just wants to take a goddamn seat because he feels like he’s been walking for a millenia, but that’s when his friends want to start looking around again. The whole time he feels like he’s hiding behind Mingyu just in case Joshua pops up again, but he doesn’t. 

They adventure through the rest of the aquarium, but Seungcheol finds it difficult to join in on conversation when he’s too busy with trying to compress his anxiety and fit it in to a little box, because the last thing he wants is for Mingyu to see Joshua and point him out. If that happens, there really will be no redemption for his self esteem. 

Eventually, the group makes it to the ice cream parlor and the gift shop near the end of the aquarium. Seungkwan decides that it would be good to take a group picture, so it’s unanimously decided that they pose with the signature cardboard mascot of the aquarium. 

“Seungcheol, look at the camera!” Seungkwan scolds, and Seungcheol quietly looks back to the camera and grins, throwing up a little peace sign as well. The picture is taken and Seungkwan’s phone is quickly snatched from his hands, and Seungkwan continues to stare at Seungcheol, trying to have a silent conversation that Seungcheol desperately wants to avoid because he’s  _ fine  _ and he doesn’t need a therapist.

“Oh, good picture. I look cute,” Chan says, looking on Seungkwan’s phone. Soonyoung makes some sort of comment about everything always being about Chan, but Seungcheol stopped listening. Seungkwan still looks concerned, but he really doesn’t need it. He’s entirely distracted by the most pressing problem of the day yet again.

Joshua’s just sitting there at one of the tables next to the ice cream parlor, looking around, and Seungcheol can almost  _ swear  _ that Joshua keeps looking at him. 

It doesn’t seem like Mingyu noticed him, because he’s bickering with Seungkwan on if they should retake the picture. Seungcheol feels like he’s stuck between a rock and a hard place because he can’t let his friends know that the now infamous Joshua is just right there, and he also doesn’t want to accidentally cause another scene. By the way Joshua is cautiously darting his eyes to and from him, he’s walking on thin ice with that. 

There’s really only one thing he can do.

“Gonna go to the bathroom,” Seungcheol says, leaving immediately. Hopefully by the time he gets out, Joshua won’t be there anymore. It doesn’t even matter if Mingyu sees him, because he doubts that he’d engage Joshua anyways.

“I’ll come with,” Seungkwan tries, tearing away from Mingyu’s grip for just a second before he’s inevitably pulled back in.

“No you’re not,” Mingyu says, grabbing Seungkwan’s shoulders and pressing his weight down so that Seungkwan’s knees buckle. “We have to reposition so that Cheol can just jump into the next picture and-” 

It’s a short walk to the bathroom, and when he’s finally in there he feels like he can  _ breathe  _ again. His loud friends are distracted with themselves, and if he spends enough time in here than maybe Joshua will just dissapear and he’ll be entirely in the clear and he’ll never have to see him again and--

Mere seconds later the door opens, and Seungcheol can see in the reflection of the mirror that it’s Joshua, radiant as ever in the shittiest of lighting.

There’s a moment where the air has frozen and Seungcheol can’t even smell the overpowering scent of mango bathroom freshener anymore.

“I swear that I’m not stalking you,” Seungcheol says, eyes not leaving Joshua’s  _ stunning  _ reflection. 

His now soft copper hair is swept to the side, showing off a bit of his forehead. He’s dressed properly for the winter, somehow managing to look clean and proper with three layers on. He’s handsome, and Seungcheol is a little bit floored because he looks  _ so  _ good without a uniform on.

“I figured,” Joshua grins, and Seungcheol feels a massive weight come off of his shoulders. He takes a step and comes up to the sink next to Seungcheol, starting to fix the collar of his long felt jacket. 

“I’m sorry I ran out on you last week. I was having a weird day. I still don’t know why I did that.” 

“Oh... it’s okay,” Seungcheol turns and leans his hip against the sink, facing Joshua straight on. He can see now that Joshua is just about the same height as he is. “My pride is a little bruised though.”

“Is it?” Joshua smiles and it makes his eyes look puffier somehow. “I’ll make it up to you.”

He pulls his phone out and hands it to Seungcheol. 

“Put your number in.” 

Seungcheol stares at him, numb confusion making his brain feel static. It takes him a second to grab the phone, holding it as if it were a foreign object, and do as he was told before handing it back. Joshua types out a message, and Seungcheol feels his phone buzz in his pocket his a second later. 

“I look forward to getting to know who you really are,” Joshua says, tilting his head just slightly towards his right shoulder in a way that makes him look absolutely charming. He turns and pushes on the door. It doesn’t budge, and it kills the air that just had Seungcheol mystified.

“It’s a pull door.” 

“Yeah- I got it,” Joshua mumbles, putting his head down and walking out of the bathroom.

Seungcheol stares at the door, digs his phone out of his pocket, and stares at the unregistered number on his screen. 

_ What the hell?  _

When he returns to the group, they usher him into the photo so quickly that he doesn’t even have time to look around and see if the coast is clear. The flash temporarily blinds him, but he quickly turns and sees Joshua leaving. 

_ Crisis averted. _

“Shit, we should’ve used Seungcheol’s phone! He’s got a better camera!” Soonyoung says, and Mingyu’s towering form immediately blocks Seungcheol’s path. Hands from behind him, presumably Chan’s, dig into his pockets. Seungcheol yelps at the egregious violation of his ass and tries to jump away, but his phone unceremoniously falls out of his pocket and flops onto the floor. Seungkwan moves to pick up the phone, eyebrows raising as he looks at the screen.

“You have a text from a new number? Says it’s Joshua.” 

Mingyu gasps loudly, eyes bulging out until he looks like a fish.

_ Nevermind.  _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> gonna try to have the next chapter up asap bc it's ~seasonally relevant~ but also i have been working every day so i do not know if that is plausible sorry in advance if you have to read about new years eve like a week after new years happens


	5. Firework Ashes & Alcohol Stashes

“...Five!”

Confetti falls through the air as people from the second story balcony fling the glittering strings in celebration, plastic snowflakes lit up by the premature fireworks beginning to pop off around the city mere seconds too early.

“...Four!” 

Seungcheol feels a tightening on both of his hands. One hand that’s awfully sweaty and hot, and the other, freezing, that can’t even bear the decent winter of Los Angeles.

“...Three!” 

On his left, Mingyu is shouting with the crowd, already looking up to the sky with sparkling eyes.

“...Two!” 

On his right, Soonyoung flings both of his arms into the air, bringing Seungcheol’s with him as he blows out his voice.

“...One!” 

Perfectly timed, a round of illegally bought fireworks begin to shoot up into the sky, exploding brilliant colors to ring in the new year. The crowd of the house party shouts blissfully, and yet, Seungcheol can still hear Seungkwan’s loud voice soaring over all of the others. 

He laughs, and Soonyoung pulls Seungcheol into a hug. From behind, Mingyu makes it a sandwich and wraps his arms around the both of them. It’s way too tight, so Seungcheol turns his head to the side to be able to breathe. 

Behind them, Jeonghan and Seokmin stand, fully wrapped up in a moment of euphoria and love. Their lips are pressed together, Jeonghan cradling Seokmin’s face, and Seokmin’s arms wrapped around Jeonghan’s shoulders. Both of their lips are curled upwards, fighting back smiles in favor of starting the new year with something meaningful. Seungcheol only sees it for half of a second, but there’s still a dull sting in his chest and a static in his brain that he just can’t rid of.

“Happy new year, you guys!” Mingyu squeals from behind. Soonyoung pulls away, and Seungcheol turns away from the couple behind them to get an overdramatic breath of air. Mingyu lets go of the both of them in favor of hugging whoever was next to him, too. 

Seungcheol is happy. Really, he is. The year felt arduously long and he’s glad to bid it good riddance. He just wishes he hadn’t seen Jeonghan looking so happy. It’s conflicting.

He  _ wants  _ Jeonghan to be happy. He just wants it  _ away  _ from him.

“Happy new year, Cheol,” Jeonghan says, and Seungcheol turns to the couple with fake shock, like he didn’t know they were right there. 

“Oh, hey! Happy new year, you guys!” Seungcheol greets, pulling Jeonghan into a hug. For the hell of it, he also pulls Seokmin into a hug. 

Seokmin is a great guy. He’s really funny and he practically shoots sunshine straight out of his ass. If things weren’t the way that they are, Seungcheol would’ve probably been close friends with him. 

It takes a while to wade through the crowd and get back into the house after that. The whole party was standing outside to watch the fireworks and celebrate, so once he was back inside it was smooth sailing. 

He pours himself another drink, says hi to the random poor idiot who missed the countdown because they spent too long in the bathroom, and sends a text off to his parents, wishing them well. 

He doesn’t really feel like sticking around. Knowing his friends, he’ll have to take someone home and nurse them out of their near grave tomorrow morning. That’s why, as everyone is still distracted and having a good time, he sneaks out.

Seungcheol wasn’t really feeling it tonight anyway. Sure, New Years is fun, but the older he gets, it’s just more annoying to go to parties. And though he refuses to admit it to himself, his chest hurts. Just a little bit. It doesn’t take much to ruin his mood.

It’s not enough to make him want to cry, but it’s enough to make him annoyed. It’s been months, and yet he still can’t get over himself. It’s fine on most days; he lives a normal, busy life. He just doesn’t really see Jeonghan anymore, and when he does, Seokmin is right there with him, holding and treasuring the same hand that Seungcheol used to.

“Damn,” Seungcheol mutters, kicking a rock. 

The house party isn’t excruciatingly far from his home, as most of the students from the local university tend to live in pretty close proximity to each other. His apartment complex is far enough to want to take a ride home, but not far enough to want to suffer through the holiday surge pricing on any ride sharing service. 

The cold weather makes him curl up on himself, hugging onto his elbows as he makes his way out of the neighborhood and through the connecting park. There was a small fireworks show tonight held by some committee he doesn’t know the name of, and despite it being a bit after midnight, there’s quite a bit of people still there. There’s groups of friends lounging out on blankets, families desperately trying to round up their children, and the usual couples. 

It hits him like a punch to a full stomach. He’s lonely, and he’s feeling upset about it. Almost to the point of anger, he thinks of how he was surrounded by friends at that party, and now he’s just alone, staring at couples that look just as happy as his ex and his soulmate. It absolutely blows. Just like that lady blowing a kiss to her boyfriend. Fucking hell! 

He decides that if he doesn’t calm himself down now, he’ll go home feeling absolutely miserable, and that means he’ll wake up in the morning feeling worse. To save himself the trouble, he trudges up a hill, past the couples and the families and the ruckus, just to get to the part of the park riddled with benches and dingy barbecue grills. 

He sits alone, staring up at the night sky. It’s really dusty out from the pollution of the fireworks, nearly to the point of stinging his eyes. Even so, there’s a few bright stars that make sitting out in the cold feel a bit worth it. He just wants life to feel beautiful again. Whether he likes it or not, he’s a dependant man, no matter how strong he is. He wants to be able to hold someone without a no homo tacked onto it. He wants to give soft kisses to a warm cheek without hearing a joking screech of disgust immediately after. He wants to be  _ in love.  _ It just feels like the universe won’t let him have it. After all, he hasn’t found his soulmate after this long, and there isn’t any sign of him having one anyway.

_ Sniff _ .

The noise cuts through his own train of thought, and he looks around. The sniff sounds gross and wet and feeble, which means that someone is probably crying. 

There’s nothing but trees and empty park benches around, but the sound of someone crying is ruining his own pity party. 

He stands up, walking towards the direction of the sniveling, just to find himself staring at the back of a tree. 

_ Sniff. Sob. _

“Everything okay?” Seungcheol asks, deciding to give the poor bastard some space. By the way they sound, they’re probably a bit worse off than he is.

The sound completely stops, as if the person stopped breathing entirely. There’s a few minutes of silence, and Seungcheol is afraid he might’ve actually scared someone to death. With a few slow, hesitant steps, he peeks over the other side of the tree. 

The familiar pair of gentle eyes look puffy and agitated, tears sparkling brighter than the stars in the fogged sky. 

“Joshua?” Seungcheol gapes, and the man exhales out the long, shaky breath he’d been holding. 

There’s plenty of things he could ask. What is he doing on the ground? What is he doing at the park? Why is he crying? 

“Are you okay?” He tries, not yet moving, just in case he’s brushed away. 

“...Not really,” Joshua says, looking down at his lap. Seungcheol can see a brown paper bag tucked between his legs. “Please don’t look at me.” 

“Christ,” Seungcheol chuckles a little, and he turns on his heel, his back against the tree. “That bad?”

“I’ll be fine tomorrow,” Joshua says, and Seungcheol winces at that. He’s said that so many times before, it’s like listening to himself. “I’m just having a rough night.” 

Seungcheol sighs, long and drawn out. 

“Me too.” 

Joshua sniffles from the other side of the tree, and Seungcheol can hear the sound of liquid being sloshed around. 

“You know how bad of an idea that is, right?” Seungcheol says, raising his brows. 

“I know.” 

“You sound fucking awful, man.” 

Joshua laughs a little at that, and repeats, “I know.” 

“Wanna talk about it?”

“No.” Josh pauses for a moment. “Maybe.” 

Seungcheol pats his thighs and grunts as he sits down on the ground. 

“Let it rip.” 

“I’m just really-” He sucks in a breath, and continues, “-miserable lately. I work a lot. I never get to see my friends, and when I do have the time to see them, it’s like I don’t fit into anyone’s schedule. It feels like I’m being forgotten by the people I don’t want to forget me.” 

Seungcheol hums, letting him know that he’s listening, and when Joshua doesn’t say anything else, he guesses it’s his turn. 

“I feel that. Feels like every time I’ve ever seen you, you’re working. Maybe consider quitting one of your jobs if it’s making you feel like this.” 

“Can’t.” Joshua laughs, bitterness lining each little puff of laughter. “My jobs don’t work that way. I can’t just walk out.” 

“Why not? You ran out of one before.” 

Nothing. The attempt at humor hit like a brick on the ground. Seungcheol rubs his own arm, feeling the sting of his bad joke. 

“I don’t mean it like that. I’m never not at work. Even now, I’m at work. The second I wake up, I’m working.” 

“Well, what are you working so hard for? Are you supporting someone else?” Seungcheol asks, adjusting a little. The ground isn’t the most comfortable place to sit.

“Not really.” 

“Yourself?”

“Not even.” 

“Then why are you working so hard?”

“I don’t have a choice.” 

The sound of liquid and a soft sigh interrupts the conversation, and Seungcheol feels really bad for the guy. 

“Mind if I come over there?” 

Seungcheol listens intently for an answer, and finally, after the longest possible moment of his life, he gets one.

“...Okay.” Joshua’s voice is barely audible, a quiet and worn whisper, but it’s enough. Seungcheol scoops himself onto his knees and moves to sit beside Joshua. 

“I won’t look at you, but sometimes it’s just nice to feel someone else’s presence when you’re feeling alone.” 

They don’t talk for a while. Seungcheol clings to himself, soaking in his own body heat as Joshua starts to sniffle again. He doesn’t cry, but each small pathetic sound hits the part of Seungcheol’s heart that contains all of his sympathy like a wrecking ball. Joshua’s pain makes him forget about his own, so he sits in silence, worrying about the wellbeing of a borderline stranger until he’s ready to speak again. Seungcheol’s ass goes numb waiting, but he’s determined to stay for as long as the other needs him. On the bright side, just sitting there is helping him sober up. 

“Sorry,” Joshua speaks up, “for not responding to any of your texts.” 

Seungcheol’s eyebrows raise a little, and he’s tempted to take a little peek at Joshua, but he stares down a tree to keep his eyes forward. 

“I figured you were busy working,” Seungcheol shrugs, and Joshua’s proceeding laugh sounds so forced that it almost hurts to hear. 

“Wow. You know me so well already.” 

“If I know you so well, how good are my chances of getting a text back? Just asking, from one lonely guy to another.” 

“I’d say they’re looking decent.”

Without thinking much about it, Seungcheol nudges Joshua’s side with his elbow, used to dealing out those sort of jabs with his friends. Anxiety flashes through his body for just a moment, but they wash away completely as there’s a soft tap back. 

“Do you want help getting home? I noticed you were drinking.” 

“Nah, I can get home just fine. You should probably take this from me though.” 

Joshua holds out the paper bag, just inches away from Seungcheol’s nose. Seungcheol takes it and peels back the bag a little bit. It’s strawberry flavored vodka and the bottle so light it’s probably just about empty. 

Seungcheol can’t help but laugh.

“H-Hey!” Joshua splutters, the embarrassment in his voice entirely audible by how squeaky it gets.

“Sorry! I won’t judge.” He licks his lips to get himself to stop laughing, but it doesn’t take the smile away. “I’ll throw it away for you, Mr. Least-Discrete-Man-in-the-World.”

“Thanks for that, Seungcheol. For staying here, too. I probably might’ve become a public disruption if something didn’t stop me.” 

“Glad I won’t have to see your mugshot on the internet later.” 

“Shut up!” Joshua says, the sound of his lips curving up into a smile make a little spit-filled click. 

“Go home. Run while you can.” 

“Will do.”

“Happy new year.” 

“And to you as well.” 

Joshua gets up, brushes off his pants, and starts walking away. He makes it a few steps, and just as the moon peeks out from the clouds, he turns his head over his shoulder and waves. His face is fully illuminated with light, and Seungcheol is too stunned at the sight of the man in front of him to even wave back. 

Every time Seungcheol looks up at the sky on his walk home, he can see those gentle eyes again, shining brighter than the dim stars in space farther than he could ever hope to comprehend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am so sorry i meant to post this on new years day exactly. and then when i didn't. i was so ashamed of myself that i didnt even open up my fic document for like 12 whole days as a mental way of calling myself a gigantic bastard!
> 
> hope you don't find it unenjoyable to read a chapter about new years 13 whole days after it lol sorry for being Bad at Scheduling and Even Worse at Accepting My Own Miss Steaks


	6. Too Close for Comfort

It  _ was  _ a nice day outside. After a week straight of endless rain and perpetually wet socks, there was a break in the downpour, a miraculous nice and clear day of sun. It seemed to be a bit warmer out now that the rain had subsided, too. Because of that, Seungcheol decided to take advantage of the change in weather and put a pause on his monotonous schedule of work, school, and sleep. Since all of his friends were busy with their own lives, he declared it a day for himself. He hauled himself downtown, hoping to buy himself something nice at the mall and get a tasty drink from the cafe. He  _ was  _ feeling pretty good, after all. 

That is, until he walked into possibly the most aggravatingly decorated cafe he’d seen in his life. It’s as if Cupid himself walked into the place with an explosive backpack just seconds before detonation, leaving behind a mess of red and pink just about everywhere. Not only are there paper hearts strung about the walls, but there’s stupidly adorable lace doilies on the normally plain tables. Hell, even some of the pastries in the glass display are heart shaped or drizzled in pink. 

For some reason, it activates his fight or flight response quicker than anything else ever has. He pulls out his phone and checks the date, his blood pumping when he sees that it’s still just  _ January _ . He feels absolutely primal, looking around with hunched shoulders as if the mythical god of love himself was going to pop out from seemingly nowhere and challenge him to a fist fight. He hates artificial, purely consumeristic holidays like this. He’d much rather randomly buy the people he holds close to him tokens of affection, but alas, companies must destroy all goodwill for the sake of monetary gain. 

It doesn’t hit him that he’s been standing in line going on a stereotypically millennial mental tangent until the barista calls out to him with a rather firm “next”. He orders himself a latte to go and hightails it out of there, saving himself from further turmoil. How ridiculous is it that simple decorations send him on a warpath? He laughs at himself and shakes his head. 

Even if it’s annoying to look at, it’s better this way than it was around the holidays. Decorations and themed music would just make him feel melancholy and alone not even a month ago. Now, he just gets annoyed at the thought of the price tags he’s going to have to look at when buying his friends and parents little themed gifts. It’s better to be unreasonably upset than a pitifully lonely sap, right? 

Thinking about his forgotten loneliness brings back that mental image of Joshua from New Years, looking even worse than Seungcheol felt. Hell, seeing the other made him sober up a bit. He wonders how he’s doing now. He’d messaged the man a few times, and although Joshua did respond, the conversations never really got anywhere. 

It’s funny how life is like that. It’s absolutely hilarious how inconvenient everything seems to be, down to simple text messages and holiday decorations. Everything is poorly timed or mentally taxing and existence is more difficult than it should be. 

These thoughts occupy his mind until he wanders into a store, sipping on his latte and considering himself to be the next Aristotle because his thoughts are reaching max complexity. They also seem to be edging at Seungcheol’s brain capacity, because as he touches each coat, all he can think of is  _ coat soft and warm like mash potato.  _

“Have a nice day!” 

A voice as warm as his latte lilts sweetly from the other far end of the store, and it’s so familiar that it distracts Seungcheol from the internet memes that circulate through his mind.

A couple turns away from the register, walking hand in hand as they exit the store. Sure enough, Joshua stands behind the register with a retail smile plastered onto his lips. Seungcheol blinks twice, making sure that he’s actually  _ seeing _ the man standing there. He idles there for a while, kind of like a sim waiting for a command. Then, Joshua looks over his shoulder and retreats quickly to the back, reaching for his name tag as he moves. Just as quickly as he fled, he re-emerges without a name tag, staring intensely at his phone as he rushes out of the store. 

Seungcheol looks, and the other employees meandering between the clothing racks don’t seem to bat an eye. Not a word was exchanged, not a glance was stolen, Joshua just walked straight out. 

It’s totally weird, but he’s intrigued and his legs are already carrying him out of the store. 

“Have a nice day!” A female employee calls, and Seungcheol looks over his shoulder. She’s still looking his way, so he gives a small wave and continues to follow Joshua. 

He picks up his pace a little, gathering his courage until he can muster up a small question. 

“Joshua?”

Joshua slows significantly, giving Seungcheol the time to take the space next to the man. He flashes a smile, but Joshua doesn’t look up.

“Hey! I thought I saw you just now.” Seungcheol smiles, “What are you up to?” 

“Oh, nothing important. Just walking around, since it’s my day off.” Joshua says, flicking his phone off with his thumb and sliding it into his pocket. 

_ Day off? _

“Cool, um,” Seungcheol continues, mentally noting how odd of a lie that is to tell. “Well I just thought I’d say hey. Nice to see you.” 

Joshua looks at his shoulder, eyes slowly gliding around like he’s scanning for something, and Seungcheol takes a step away. He looks around, trying to see what Joshua is looking at, but he doesn’t see anything besides shop entrances, and over his shoulder, the parking lot. That’s a good exit.

“So, uh, I’ll let you-“ 

“Hey, you wanna grab food or something?” Joshua speaks, and Seungcheol’s gaze snaps back to the man. He’d just turned back to face Seungcheol breathing in before continuing, “I’ve been meaning to talk to you since New Years, but, uh...” 

Joshua’s chin lowers, but his eyes remain connected with Seungcheol’s. The sun hasn’t quite set yet, and like black holes absorb light, Joshua’s eyes take in the sunlight and shine brilliantly. 

With a voice dripping of raw Californian honey, he says, “I’m sort of shy with texting.” 

How can he say no when Joshua looks at him like  _ that _ ? Seungcheol feels his gut drop like something had tugged down onto it harshly, and his heart flutters with the new room that it’s been given. He’s got nothing more than a monkey’s brain, because all he can think about is how pretty the man is. 

“Yeah, I’m free right now.” 

“Cool. Um, coffee?” 

“Already ahead of you,” Seungcheol holds up his latte, still warm in his hand, “but I’ll sit with you.” 

“How sweet of you,” Joshua snorts, turning on his heel. Seungcheol stands stunned for a few seconds, but quickly catches up to Joshua, and they walk the short distance to the cafe together. 

Seungcheol isn’t as mad at the decorations as he was earlier upon stepping into the cafe the second time. On the contrary, they make him more nervous. The decorations are so cute and romantic that they make his palms sweaty. He goes and picks a table as Joshua waits in line to get himself a drink. The short line gives Seungcheol just enough time to give himself a Mingyu-style peptalk. 

_ I’m cool and sexy. I’m the secret eighth wonder of the world. A random lady in a club once said I’m daddy material. Soonyoung said that if he had to fuck any of his friends he’d choose me during truth or dare that one time in sophomore year. Seungkwan once said that my breath didn’t smell bad. I can do anything I set my sexy mind to. I—  _

“Thanks for waiting,” Joshua’s voice interrupts Seungcheol’s train of thought for the second time today, causing Seungcheol to sit up straight in his chair like a student preparing for class.

“Yeah, no problem.” 

There’s a lull in the conversation as Joshua looks around the cafe, and Seungcheol mentally begs Joshua not to bring up the Valentine’s day decorations  _ please I’m begging you do not bring up th— _

“It’s so cute in here,” Joshua says softly, even though his voice is always sort of gentle like that, “I should plan a date here.” 

Seungcheol’s brain shorts out. There’s nothing there. He’s not usually the type to panic, but cute boys tend to make him nervous. Joshua isn’t just a cute boy, though, he’s stunning and he just appears everywhere and Seungcheol starts thinking that he’s  _ gotta respond before Joshua thinks he’s weird as hell. _

“Yeah, that would be cute.” 

“Do you like Valentine’s day?” 

“Uh, well, I can’t say it’s got any special significance to me at the moment…” 

“Oh, still single?” Joshua leans on the table, elbows propped up to rest his chin on interlocked fingers. “I can change that for you.”

Seungcheol, who had unfortunately decided to take a swig of his latte, nearly chokes on the liquid. He ends up chugging a bit of it just to get the air down. 

“Are you hitting on me?” 

“No,” Joshua’s lips curve into a grin, “I just know somebody who could help you out.” 

Seungcheol blinks, and he’s not sure that he’s relieved that he didn’t get hit on or is sorely disappointed that he was curved like that. 

“I’m okay. Valentine’s is kind of expensive, so I guess I’m fine with staying single until it blows over.” 

“Hm, okay.” Joshua shrugs before continuing on, “How about your friends? What were they…” 

Seungcheol’s brow raises as Joshua pulls away from the table, digging into his pocket and taking out his phone. Seungcheol sits up a little in his chair, trying to take a peek at Joshua’s screen, but the other angles it away. 

“Yoon Jeonghan and Lee Seokmin, they’re together, right?” 

His nerves wash away in an instant, and the hairs on the back of his neck slowly raise to stand on their ends. He’d let himself shove aside the fact that Joshua does weird things like running out of his jobs. However, this is less weird and more intensely terrifying.

“How do you know—?” 

“How about Lee Chan and Kwon Soonyoung, are they doing well?” Joshua stares down at his phone, no longer scrolling around for anything as he continues, “Or maybe Boo Seungkwan and Kim Mingyu? Have they gotten together yet? Their timers are running low. They’re due to acknowledge each other soon.”

With each drop of a name, Seungcheol can feel his gut twisting, becoming heavier with the weight of dread. His once clammy hands feel cold, and the bright reds and the pinks of the decorations around them don’t look as pigmented anymore. 

Seungcheol leans forward, lowering his voice in volume, the pitch of it deepening with seriousness. 

“Why do you know their names?”

The question hangs in the air for a moment, Joshua’s face illuminated white by his phone screen. The other hums quietly and crosses one leg over the other, simply letting time go by. With each passing second, Seungcheol can feel his gut twisting in horror at the violation of his privacy. Hell, not even his, but his  _ friends _ , and that matters significantly more.

“Oh, come to think of it, I don’t know your full name.” Joshua looks up from his phone, the same grin on his face as before. His grin curves up into a smile, a mirror image of the one he’d seen behind the register. 

It’s absolutely indecipherable and it’s so obviously fake, but yet, it’s the most convincing fake smile he’s ever seen. It’s impossible to tell what Joshua is thinking, and Seungcheol doesn’t know if he wants to know. Fear creeps through his body like a thief, stealing every last ounce of warmth in his body.

“Would you mind telling me, Seungcheol?” 

“Why?” 

His fists tighten, preparing himself for the answer.

“Simple,” Joshua shrugs, “I’m trying to find out who you are.” 

It’s too much. Seungcheol stands up despite the weighted feeling in his lungs, and Joshua’s smile immediately fades from his features. His eyes, as rounded and soft as they are, look so cold. Chocolate brown never looked so soulless. It takes most of Seungcheol’s strength to take a step away, and then another, until finally, he’s far enough from the chair that he can turn and leave. 

“Wait,” Joshua says, but it does not stop Seungcheol from his goal of getting the hell out of there as quickly as possible. 

He walks until he’s back out into the open, and keeps going until he’s in the safety of his own car. Once in his seat, he slumps, resting his forehead on the steering wheel. His heart feels like it’s been beating against a steel cage, painfully constricted, making it hard to breathe. 

Everything that Joshua has done thus far has been odd. As human as he is, he seems  _ different _ . He appears seemingly anywhere, and disappears just as easily. He works, but in too many places. He blends in to the point that he’s basically invisible, but yet, he’s unmistakably beautiful. It’s unusual. Joshua doesn’t seem normal. 

With sickness settling in his stomach, he pulls out his phone and stares blankly at his screen, his mind racing too quickly to even move his hands.

No, he’s definitely not normal. The fact that he knows such intimate details about his closest friends is disturbing. 

The sickness turns into full force nausea. Seungcheol can’t risk anything; he doesn’t want to even consider the possibility of any of his friends being put in harm’s way. With shaking hands, he blocks Joshua’s number. It should be enough for now, or at least, he hopes it will be. Now, it’s just a matter of never seeing that man again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im sick!  
> also spring semester started so that means my updates will increase because i do not want to do homework or they will decrease because i am doing homework! also thanks for the comments and kudos and everything its really cool to see that kind of stuff 
> 
> we're getting into the cool part of the story so i hope u enjoy it! next two chapters will be very fun make ur speculations now! 
> 
> also i was told to title this chapter that because my best friend who also betas this fic told me to do it mwah love u


	7. The Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon

Seungcheol has never debated walking into his campus’ mental health facility more intensely than in the past two weeks. It’s not because he’s going through something, nor is he having a period of anxiety. Well, he could be, but he’s pretty sure he’s going batshit insane. 

He thought he was flying off of the handle when he was a freshman, taking 18 credits and working a part-time job, so stressed that he was pretty sure he was seeing things due to chronic lack of sleep. He thought he knew terror when he drunkenly vowed to do a kick flip into a swimming pool that was too shallow to dive in, his spine hitting concrete in the most unpleasant way imaginable. He was sure he knew paranoia after binging a week’s worth of crime documentaries in a single night. Now, he’s feeling paranoid in broad daylight, looking over his shoulder to make sure something isn’t creeping behind him. He feels as if he’s seeing things-- or rather, a  _ thing _ \-- even when sleeping much longer than any self-respecting human should be. When he was first experiencing that spectre of a man, he thought he was just having some weird attraction fueled placebo effect. It’s much different now.

It’s a loosely grounded hypothesis, but he’s pretty sure he’s being stalked. Perhaps it’s the terror that’s been built up in his brain after having the privacy of his friends violated, but anywhere he goes, he feels like Joshua is looming in the outskirts of his vision again.

The grocery store. Cafes. The campus library. Gas stations. Fast food places. In storefront windows of flower shops, boutiques, and other establishments. Behind every corner of any given aisle, there’s a pair of gentle eyes following him silently, blending in with his surroundings with a neat uniform and a name tag. It’s a fleeting glimpse of  _ that  _ man’s lanky form each time, and it’s all Seungcheol needs to feel fear scraping through his spine and seeping out of his pores as cold, uncomfortable sweat. It’s become a nearly everyday occurrence, and with every glance, it’s becoming increasingly hard to ignore. Every day, Joshua seems like he’s closer, closer,  _ closer _ , from behind a counter, to a bookshelf away.

However, Joshua  _ never  _ seems to notice him first, which is probably messing with Seungcheol’s head the most. It could be the perfect planning of a psychopath, but no matter what, it’s always Seungcheol noticing the other man like he’s just naturally there without any prompt or reason to be there besides living out his own life. Doesn’t matter what day it is. Doesn’t matter what Joshua is wearing or what color his hair is. Doesn’t even matter what direction he’s facing or what he’s looking at. He doesn’t get the initial feeling that he’s being followed, he just turns a corner and the man is just standing there, looking at soup cans or books or something completely random. There’s no taped on, plastic looking smile as he smiles at any given passerby or customer. Seeing such natural moments from someone who knew an unnatural amount of details about someone else’s life makes Seungcheol feels like  _ he’s  _ the one doing the stalking, which in his mind, is definitely not the case!

He’s started racking his brain, searching for some explanation, absolutely any conclusion that makes decent sense, as to what the hell is actually going on. It’s nothing sort of fact; There’s no way two people can repeatedly be in the exact same place so many different times unless it’s entirely intentional. It  _ has  _ to be intentional. 

In the case that it isn’t intentional and he won’t be ending up on the next episode of  _ Dateline _ , he’d researched a little bit for a coherent reason. Whenever he couldn’t sleep well, or couldn’t focus in class, he spent time researching whatever words made a lick of sense to his situation. There wasn’t much despite websites trying to diagnose him with some psychosomatic disorder, which was as frustrating as it was intriguing. After many failed attempts at getting a possible connection, he found something that vaguely helped ease his fears temporarily. He’d briefly read into the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon, some mental effect where one stumbles upon some obscure piece of information—often an unfamiliar word, name, and in rare cases, a face—and soon afterwards encounters the same subject again, often repeatedly. However, it was defined as something that’s completely natural and isn’t absolutely creepy like Joshua is with his stupid (probably devious) grin and his bone-chilling dreamy eyes.

It’s a hopeless search, and yet, he still swears on his life-- and he’ll include the lives of his friends too-- that he’s going to start swinging the moment Joshua enters a 3ft radius. His growing questions and lack of answers only make him more fearful, deciding that the minute that man opens his mouth to speak a single word, Seungcheol will scoop every ounce of energy from his body to deal the most damage he is physically capable of. He’s pretty sure he could take him. He’s been in a few fights before, mostly sloppy drunk ones, but they still count because he won. Fuck the flight-or-fight response, it’s fight-or-fight now. 

Keeping that same spirit up, he trots pridefully through the walkways of his college campus, past the gym and the mental health facility, through the library and up a flight of stairs. He gets lost looking at some message board in the hall on the way to a study room when he accidentally bumps forcefully into someone else’s shoulder. The force of the bump knocks Seungcheol back a little, and it seems to do the exact same to the other person. He turns a little bit on his heel to apologize, and the other male seemed to have the same idea. 

“Oh, sorry-” Seungcheol says, locking eyes with Joshua. 

The other looks at him with the wide eyes of a doe trapped in a pair of bright headlights, blinking at twice the speed of a normal human. He has his hands lazily tucked into his backpack straps, staring at Seungcheol with lips parted softly, as if still trying to register what situation he’s in and what he should say. 

However, Seungcheol doesn’t want to give the other a single second of thought. He turns on both of his feet, springing backwards with a stumble. His shoes squeak beneath him and his fists ball up at his sides, his own fingernails digging into the soft flesh of his palms. He coils a fist back, an elbow locking behind him like a spring locks into a pinball machine. Mentally pushing the plastic handle back, his fist launches forward, the silver pinball in his vision positioned perfectly onto one of those gently sloped cheekbones. He let a short yell out to fuel his fires, and before his fist had landed, Joshua crumbled downward, his hands flying from the straps of his backpack. Seungcheol swings at nothing but air as Joshua lunges forward, throwing his arms around the other’s waist. 

“You bastard, let me go!” Seungcheol roars.

“No!” Joshua yells back, using the momentum to drive them both backwards. 

The two stumble as Seungcheol yells indiscriminately, the awkward angle making it impossible to land a good hit. He fists a hand into Joshua’s now platinum blond hair, trying to pull the other away from his torso by force. Joshua pulls back, his face scrunched up in pain and his eyes shut. An odd sense of satisfaction from seeing his stalker in pain rises in his stomach, and before he can drive the other backwards with the force of his fist, Joshua uses the strength in his legs to knock Seungcheol back with another push to his torso. His eyes shut with pain, falling backwards through a door. 

Suddenly, it’s not quiet like it normally is on the 3rd floor study hallways of the library. It’s loud, like the endless ruckus of a busy street. There’s intelligible chattering all around, and the grip around his torso quickly lets loose. Seungcheol opens his eyes, prepared to apologize to some poor study group that they’d accidentally barged in on. 

Instead, he opens his eyes to see a large, archaic stone chapel in front of them. It’s gothic in style, with a gorgeous stained glass window in the center of the front wall. It’s brilliantly constructed with details in even the tightest corners of the cathedral, the entrance decorated with pointed walkways that contrast the square architecture of the grand building. 

It’s beautiful. Something that stunning just doesn’t  _ exist  _ in Los Angeles.

Seungcheol blinks, a scream getting choked off in his throat as the breath is taken from him completely. Absolutely dumbfounded, he lets loose a cough he’d kept inside from the impact of nearly getting the wind pushed out of him. He looks to the side, watching as Joshua stands up straight and pats down his hair. On instinct, Seungcheol takes a step behind the other and looks around the street he ended up on. 

For starters, it’s dark out, with potted plants and trees sprouting from the earth alike, aligned in rows beneath the golden glow of storefronts and old fashioned iron street lights that illuminate the uneven stone streets. The brisk air doesn’t seem to bother the busy streets, as dozens of people walk along and go about their daily lives. There’s obvious tourists, overly dressed for the cold in unnecessary layers of clothing, stopping to take pictures at every corner. Everywhere he looks, there’s something pretty to stare at, from the statuettes on the corners of buildings to the sparkling night sky. Old, ornate signs hang above each establishment in a language that Seungcheol sure as hell can’t read. 

_ Le Bistrot De Lyon Br-Bra?  _

Seungcheol squints at a sign, and grabs onto Joshua’s arm, gripping tightly at the only thing that’s somewhat recognizable. In this case, unfortunately, it’s Joshua’s sleeve.

“Where the fuck are we?” Seungcheol asks, keeping his voice low.

Joshua taps on his phone, humming to fill the space between the question and the eventual answer. 

“Lyon, France,” he says, and starts walking like all of this is just a regular, everyday occurrence for him.

“Why the-- How the fuck are we here?” Seungcheol raises his voice a little, following after Joshua like a lost dog. 

“Can you not flip out? I’ve got things to do,” Joshua says, shaking his arm in an attempt to get Seungcheol to loosen up a little bit. 

Seungcheol gawks, absolutely incredulous, but refuses to let go of Joshua. Eventually, the arm stills, Joshua probably just accepting that he’s going to have to deal with it. 

They wade through crowds, couples, and individuals, and as much as Seungcheol tries to get a word in, there’s never a response. At a street corner, Joshua abruptly stops and looks down at his phone.

“Hey. I’m dreaming, right? This is just a dream? I knocked my head into a door and passed out, right?” Seungcheol tries, tugging at Joshua’s sleeve again. 

“ _ Shhhh _ ut up!” Joshua hisses. “I’m busy!”

“So then why am I here?” Seungcheol asks, whispering with as much rage as he can possibly muster in a quiet voice. 

“It was a mistake. Also, you attacked me first? Whatever, I’ll explain it in a minute. Just shut up!” 

Seungcheol fumes silently, but he jolts as Joshua’s head suddenly snaps upward. Joshua moves to the side, hiding beneath the shadowy corner that the streetlight doesn’t reach. Seungcheol stands behind him, his fingers stuck in an iron grip onto the soft cloth of Joshua’s cardigan. He follows Joshua’s line of sight, looking out into the crowd. 

“Stay here,” Joshua orders, reaching up to take Seungcheol’s hand away from his sleeve. 

“Wait-“ Seungcheol tries weakly, but it’s no use. Joshua walks away, disappearing momentarily into the wave of strangers. 

Luckily, Seungcheol is able to keep his eyes on him as the bright blond mop on his head and the sheer height of the lad serves as a pretty good indicator. Joshua eventually steps off to the side, waits for a moment, and then quickly shoves out an ankle to trip a man with three precariously overfilled bags of produce threatening to spill from his arms. Joshua quickly scampers off as the man falls into the back of another man, causing a wide-scale collision. 

In the commotion, Seungcheol completely loses sight of that beaming light bulb of a head. Most of the people that had stumbled or fallen had already gotten back up with a brief uttered curse, but the man with the produce hadn’t yet recovered. He stood slowly as the man he’d fallen into had begun yelling, understandably pissed off. Produce guy did nothing but stop and touch the other man’s cheek, effectively silencing him. It seemed that the world stood still for the two of them, besides the turbulent crowd stepping over the ruined produce and shoving past the two men. 

It’s a sweet scene as the two men reach for each other, as if learning what touch feels like for the first time, skin gliding against skin and shining eyes meeting a matching pair. 

“Sorry, I’m back now.”

Seungcheol flinches, a whole body reaction as he’s forcibly drawn away from the scene by Joshua's voice.

“Fffucking-” Seungcheol hisses, putting a hand over his heart to stop it from thumping straight out of his body. “How did you get back here?”

“I snuck back that way,” Joshua points to the other end of the crowd, where the potted plants block off a square of pavement. An easy escape route. 

“Why’d you trip that guy, you dick?”

“Had to. It’s in the job description. I had to make them crash into each other so that they could meet.” 

Seungcheol twists his neck to look at Joshua, squinting at him. 

“Why?” 

Joshua’s plump, petal soft lips curve upward, and his dark eyes shine with delight. 

“Because they’re soulmates!” 

Seungcheol is taken aback by the calm beauty of the man before him, the breeze sweeping the blond bangs from his face. It’s so clear, his skin so porcelain and soft, that it makes Seungcheol’s insides warp, his stomach feeling like it's going through a meat grinder.

“Why do you know that?” he asks, quickly growing nauseous. “I don’t understand.”

Joshua’s smile drops, and he sighs, his shoulders slumping as he lets air out.

“I thought you of all people would understand.” 

“I don’t.” Seungcheol feels like his head is going to split. His world is spinning, and he repeats, “I don’t.” 

Seungcheol crouches down, clutching onto his own head. He feels like he’s going to vomit. If he’s not dreaming, then he’s halfway across the world. If he’s not in some weird, warped nightmare, Joshua can just fucking  _ teleport _ . He feels horribly sick, like he’s been let in on some awful government conspiracy that he shouldn’t have known. It’s gravity defying, and the lack of gravity has left him feeling like he’s going to crash into the earth faster than anyone could record it. 

“I want to go home,” he mumbles, swallowing down so much of his own saliva that he feels disgusting. “Take me home.”

“Are you sure?” Joshua questions. He crouches down to Seungcheol’s level, but Seungcheol doesn’t look up, only seeing Joshua’s dirty sneakers. 

“Yes,” he chokes out. 

“Okay.”

With that, Joshua holds out his hand where Seungcheol can see it. He hesitates, waiting for the earth to stop spinning and regain its normal axis, before he takes the hand he’s been offered. He stares down at their grasp, even as Joshua starts walking, merely trusting the other to take them back to their university. He closes his eyes, finding it easier to filter out all of the unfamiliar noise when he sees nothing but the dark. There’s the sound of a door opening, his hand being continuously tugged on, and as the door shuts behind them, there’s silence. 

Tentatively, Seungcheol opens his eyes, and he sees a familiar wooden floor. He looks up to see an ugly blue couch, a coat hanger, a decently priced television and a boring square archway that leads to a kitchen. His kitchen. He’s home. 

Which is even more terrifying than fucking  _ France _ .

“How did we get into my apartment!” Seungcheol screeches, tearing his hand away from Joshua’s and holding it tightly with his own against his chest. 

“Stop screaming, dude! You told me to take you home!” 

“But HOW!” Seungcheol emphasizes, his backpack hitting his own front door behind him, “ _ How _ did we get into my apartment?”

“Because you gave me specific, very explicit permission to take you here!” Joshua raises his own voice a bit, his tone pleading with the other to make sense. 

“That’s not what I mean!”

Joshua sighs again, longer and drawn out. He bends at the hip and runs his hands down his face until they’re cupped over his lips, and then proceeds to groan loudly into his palms, frustrated. He stands up straight again, corrects his posture by squaring up his shoulders, and exhales out of his nose. 

“Okay. It’s clear to me now that you aren’t in the know. We can talk about that later.” 

“No, Joshua. I want to know now.” Seungcheol’s tone is demanding, lowered back to its normal pitch, albeit a bit shakier, and he continues, “But I don’t want you in my apartment. It scares me.”

“No biggie, then.” Joshua grins, polite and plastic, patting his own thighs. “If you wanted to go anywhere in the world, and I mean absolutely anywhere, where would you go?” 

Seungcheol inhales, closes his eyes, and thinks. He thinks of all of his favorite places: Huntington Beach, the hidden  _ Snow White _ fountain at Disneyland, his Grandma’s warm dining room table, his hometown… 

With his mind clear and feeling a bit calmer, he opens his eyes. 

“I want to go to my hometown. Daegu, in South Korea. It doesn’t matter where.” 

Joshua nods quietly, and offers out his hand.

“Daegu it is.”

Seungcheol drops his backpack from his shoulders, setting it next to the wall. With the extra weight off, he takes in a deep breath and takes Joshua’s hand, cool-skinned and calm. He moves aside, giving the other plenty of room. 

Joshua steps forward, grips the doorknob, and turns to Seungcheol before opening the door. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey hello hi! 
> 
> didnt think it would take me this long to update, sorry !!  
> i got too into my own head abt ~writing~ and felt like i couldnt produce anything that matched my ideas but i think that............ this is alright! thanx for readin, ill try to update more frequently and to not be a Big Wuss. 
> 
> shout out yet again to my best friend for supporting everythign i do and being my spine and giving me confidence to post things
> 
> also i made a twitter so we can talk n be friends n stuff n u can ask me question on my cc if u want or give me ideas or just whatever! @bigcaratfool


	8. The Abnormality of Joshua Hong

First, there’s a familiar noise-- the sound of airtight, automatic doors opening before his eyes flutter open. Passing through the door, he felt as if an unseen force had made him squint, and now, as his large lashes give way for his large eyes to flutter open, they’ve just barely begun registering that they’re inside of some place. He looks to the side to see poles perpendicular to him with seats built into the floor of what seems to be a pod, and out of the small windows a dark station greets them. 

Joshua had already stepped ahead of him, outside of what Seungcheol now recognizes as a cable car. The tug at their still-joined hands reminds Seungcheol to move, so he does, following Joshua into the dark station. In close view, there’s a control room, a seat left unoccupied. It’s eerie like this, with no other visual or audible proof that there’s anyone else around. Only the sound of wind whipping past the cable car entrance makes it feel like this place is still somewhere on Earth.

“It looks pretty dead here.” Joshua says, his soft voice echoing in the empty station as if he were speaking directly into a tunnel. It’s almost as overwhelming as being halfway across the world.  _ Again _ . 

Seungcheol fishes his phone from his pocket, and miraculously, it had adjusted to the time difference. 

“It’s about to be 6 am. Wherever we are, it’s probably closed. It’s not even dawn yet.” Seungcheol slips his phone back into his pocket as he speaks. 

He lets go of Joshua’s hand, deciding that he’d been holding on for too long now. Being in a quiet station was messing with his nerves, and he  _ hates  _ feeling scared, so he forces himself to just keep walking before he got chills like a baby. Seungcheol takes a few quick steps into the lead and makes his way up a staircase. A beam labelled with a large gold plaque reading ‘Apsan Observatory Deck’ hangs just above the exit, and a surge of excitement shoots upward through his spine. With newfound courage, be picks up his arms and jogs the rest of the way up the staircase. 

The first whiff of fresh air has his brain firing every flashbulb memory that it’s capable of digging up. The crisp air brushes against his cheeks like his first field trip in elementary, when he was brought up onto this same deck with a group of friends and classmates. It brings back the distant sound of his friends shouting in chorus into the hills to see how far the leaves of the thousands of trees could carry their little voices. It smells like the dirt of the hiking trails his group of rebellious teenage friends would take all the way up to the peak, just to chat about nothing that held any significance and stare down at the city like they were too good for it. The cool of the breeze feels like the first time he held his crush’s hand, the first time he’d been kicked out of somewhere by a cop, the first time he’d really  _ seriously  _ debated on leaving his hometown.

His legs carry him forward to the end of the deck, and although it isn’t the highest point of the mountain, he can see the whole city. Everything is still lit up and glittery, and he feels a tug at his heart at the familiarity of it all. It’s been so long since he’d been back at his hometown. It hits him now, harder than ever, that he never calls home anymore. 

He clutches onto the bar, freezing from the night, and exhales. 

“You seem like you’re going through it right now.” 

Joshua’s soft voice disrupts the silence, and somehow it sounds like it melds perfectly with the wind swirling through the greenery below.

“Yeah, kind of,” Seungcheol speaks as he closes his eyes to properly soak in all of the  _ feelings  _ he gets from being up here, “I didn’t think I’d be back home like this.” 

“Well, you’re welcome?” 

Seungcheol lets go of the bar and turns around, leaning against the cold steel. He crosses his arms, mostly to warm his hands, but it also works as a way of keeping himself collected. As it is now, he’s already on the brink of being emotionally overstimulated. In front of him is Joshua, sitting on a flat, fake wood bench, looking more collected than Seungcheol can even fathom being right now.

“I still don’t know how we got here.” 

“Right,” Joshua nods, “And that confuses me.” 

“How so?”

Joshua inhales deeply, his whole body leaning back as his shoulders rise. He slaps his hands down onto his knees, slowly dragging them upward to grip at his thighs. He closes his eyes as he breathes out, and when they eventually flit open, Seungcheol feels like they’re shooting arrows straight through his soul. 

“Do you want the short explanation, or the long one?” 

Seungcheol purses his lips and nods at nothing, just bobbing his head in thought. 

“I think I’ll take the long one. The park doesn’t open for a while, if I remember right.” 

It’s Joshua’s turn to nod now, and he takes another deep breath in. His eyes stare downward at something, probably the tip of his nose, and Seungcheol guesses that the other is trying to figure out where to begin. 

“I guess since we’re in your hometown, I should start with mine?” 

Seungcheol nods again, this time with a bit more haste, and perhaps a smidge of impatience.

Joshua’s full name is Joshua Hong. According to his memories, as fuzzy as they grow with age and the onslaught of constant information, he was born and raised lovingly in Los Angeles. He was an only child to a very small family, and he grew up going to church practically every week. His family was determined on raising him the right way, with kindness and patience and self control and everything else you learn at a children’s church assembly. He had a few hobbies, like every kid did, and was as normal and as awkward as anybody else as he continued to grow.

But like everyone else on the face of the earth, he developed some sort of complex, wanting to be set apart from the rest of the population. Wanting to be  _ special _ . He truly felt like he could make something out of himself. Perhaps a rocket scientist or a singer-- he was a pretty boy who knew how to play Maroon 5 on the guitar; he figured he could probably manage it. 

Yet, there was nothing in his life that made him extraordinary. No grades got him into a sophisticated science college that his family didn’t even have the money for, no random party that he didn’t even get invited to get him hooked up to some Hollywood executive... By the time he was turning 18, he was still just some normal west coast kid that had nothing better to do than bum about in front of an In-N-Out after class and play “Can’t Help Falling In Love With You” by Elvis as if it were the best series of guitar chords in existence. 

“At least I still have a soulmate, I would keep thinking, just trying to make myself feel better,” Joshua says, his eyes glued to his hands.

When he turned 18, things took an even more depressing turn for him. The last thing he was betting on to make him feel special: his soulmark, but it never showed up. He had no traceable soulmate symptom-- no matter how much he was tested. Some kids grow up with their symptom. Some kids wait for a soulmark when they become an adult. However, Joshua had been exactly the same since birth, and nothing had changed. It seemed that even the universe turned a blind eye to Joshua, telling him he really didn’t matter at all.

“And it sucked.” There’s a palpable bitterness in Joshua’s voice. “I grew up being told that I was going to do something special, because I was so talented and smart and great. I don’t think there’s a more cruel wake-up call than that. It was basically a sign from the universe telling me to go screw myself.”

However, his high school graduation had changed him more than he had expected it to.

On the night after his graduation, he’d been blinded by a dream. His vision was blanketed in white, and there was nothing but a feeling of absolute calm until someone appeared before him. Eros, the God of Love, showed himself to Joshua in the form of a pink aura blooming in front of him. He was then told that his true father, Eros, was a man of nearly infinite lovers, and Joshua was a byproduct of a night of passion. In other words, Joshua Hong is a child of Eros. Even more simply, Joshua Hong is a demigod. He was then given two options-- return to life as normal and live with no knowledge of his celestial lineage, or trade it all, his family, his whole life that had already been traveled and the life that he had laid out before him to live an extraordinary life as a Cupid. And Joshua, finally receiving the validation that he had always sought after, took the deal. He became a messenger and a protector of love, ensuring that no human would end up alone.

Joshua sighs, winded by his own explanation. 

“You can’t imagine how it felt, learning that your whole life was just a placeholder for something entirely different. The family I had grown up with, the home I lived in… Everything that I loved more than anything else in the world. All of it was never really mine. So, really, what other choice did I have?

“When I took the deal to work with my real father, I stopped existing normally. If I need to be somewhere to ensure that everything is going according to plan, I just walk in and act like I work there, and I do. No one questions it. I just blend in to wherever I’m needed, I leave when I’m not needed, and no one remembers me. If my family or my childhood friends saw me, they wouldn't recognize me. I would be nothing more than a stranger to them, just another passerby in a world where there are millions of people. I’m supposed to be a faceless memory for the majority of the people that I help. But like that, it didn’t take long for me to get lonely. The downside of having this power is that people shouldn’t be able to recognize or remember me.”

“That… fucking bites. It really does,” Seungcheol murmurs.

In any other situation, he would never believe such a tall tale. However, the planets have aligned to give him such a specific set of circumstances that led him to this very moment. He’s in Daegu with a demigod and he has no idea where to begin processing it all. So, he starts with a question.

“So… you don’t have any friends?”

“I do have friends. I have people that know an entirely fabricated version of myself that I’ve led people into believing, and as much as I can act like myself, it’s never really me. No one ever really knows who I truly am. It’s so cold and lonely all the time, Seungcheol, but I became so numb to it that I started not to really mind it anymore. Besides, my existence is for the better of other people. I’m here so that other people can find the path that will lead them to their soulmate. But…” 

Joshua looks forward again, standing up. He approaches Seungcheol, leveling him with only his eyes. Seungcheol feels weighted to the ground, unable to move, despite the delicate fragility in the way the other holds himself. Seungcheol watches as Joshua passes him to lean against the railing, and naturally, he turns to join the demigod in leaning against the railway and watching as Joshua stares down at the forest below. 

Seungcheol, on the other hand, studies Joshua’s side profile. His pronounced under eye bags make his eyes seem impossibly soft, a perfectly rounded button nose, but the sharpness of his facial structure makes it seem as if he were truly carved from stone by a god. Looking at him, it makes perfect sense that someone this absolutely unreal would be, well, the actual spawn of a god.

“...I met you, and you didn’t forget me. It scared me. I thought maybe you were some sort of force that was out to kill me, or that my powers were being taken away for some random mistake that I was unaware of. Then I started to think: why did you recognize me anyways? I feel like maybe I was too forward, because then you started avoiding me, started being afraid of me. Every time I saw you, you were moving as quickly away from me as possible, and it confused me even more. I feel like there has to be a reason that you always seem to be where I am. I think you might just be one of my kind.”

Joshua turns, and his deep brown eyes scattered with glistening stars look so glassy, so hopeful, that Seungcheol is caught off guard again. He’s rendered entirely defenseless, lost in the beauty of space that lies behind that comforting color. Something, a knife-like feeling, twists slowly into his gut, and he starts agonizing over his next words, wondering how he should let the other down. 

“I’m really sorry, Joshua, but… You’ve just got an ordinary guy on your hands,” Seungcheol speaks softly, the warmth in his voice nothing more than the quiet embers of a slowly dying fire. 

Joshua’s expression falls, his curving eyebrows causing his eyelids to sag over slightly in the most heartbreaking way possible. He turns his head and closes his eyes, nodding with an acceptance that is probably too painful for Seungcheol to fully comprehend. 

“Could you tell me why you think so?” Joshua says, his voice nearly a whisper, yet the words feel like screaming to Seungcheol.

“I remember about as much as any other ordinary human would about their life. For as long as I can remember, I lived in Daegu with my parents until I went off to college in L.A. I’ve got plenty of random achievements, like being the captain of my soccer team in high school and being on the honor roll for most of my school life, but I can assure you that you’re the first god I’ve ever had personal contact with.”

Joshua doesn’t say anything, and Seungcheol bites at his own lower lip, wishing that he could fill the silence with something that would make Joshua feel better. 

He turns back towards his city, wondering how it would feel for his family, just over in the distant clutter of buildings, to not recognize the face of their own son. Suddenly, the calls from his mother don’t seem so tedious. The random emailed pictures of dinner or fish his father caught don’t seem so mindless… He has a place with his family, a home across the sea, and Joshua… Joshua doesn’t really have a place anywhere. He’s condemned to being tethered in and out of existence, just for the sake of other people being happy.

As Seungcheol’s trail of thought grows longer, the dark sky has lost its solid deep color and has changed into a gentle gradient of soft blue at the horizon where the sun would rise and wish the country a calm morning. 

“You know,” Seungcheol starts slowly, looking over at Joshua from the corner of his eyes, “You said you don’t have any friends that know who you really are, but you have me now.” 

Joshua smiles down at nothing, probably the trees, and breathes out with a small chuckle, “First you flirt with me, then you fear me, and now you’re befriending me. You’re so confusing.” 

“So what?” 

Joshua nods and purses his lips, and Seungcheol watches every action closely with bated breath. 

“I have no idea what to think of you.” 

“Great! I have no idea what to think of you either.” Seungcheol gives a smile, beaming like he’s really trying to sell this whole friendship package. “We can figure each other out later, yeah?” 

Joshua bites his lip as he smiles, “Do you mean in the friendly way, or in the way that you tried to hit on me at a Denny’s, of all places?”

Seungcheol’s smile falters, and he can feel his face heating up because that’s honestly still such a personal low for him and Joshua just  _ had  _ to go and bring it up because he’s the son of the god of love and also apparently being a snarky little asshole--

“Shut up,” Seungcheol grumbles, purposefully tearing his eyes away to get a view of the sky again. 

Before he’d realized it, the sky had acquired a golden, pinkish glow. The sun was about to make its way into the sky, starting the day for so many people that Seungcheol will never meet; so many people that Joshua might’ve already met.

“How about this: if we ever hang out, I’ll let you know what I want it to be. But you’re on thin ice, buddy,” Seungcheol mumbles, and Joshua’s clear laugh rings in the air. 

“Okay, I’ll keep my schedule as open as I can.”

A bird begins to sing, chirping a tune that seemingly summons the sun. As if on cue, daybreak has come, and Joshua is smiling again.

“So, uh…” Seungcheol folds his hands, tapping his thumbs together nervously. “Do you think you could give me a one-way teleportation ticket ride home?”

“Sure.” The weight of Joshua’ hand on his shoulder shocked Seungcheol way more than it probably should have. “Let’s get out of here before security finds us. It would suck to end up on a watch list this early in the morning.” 

“I’m with you on that!”

The two make their way back to the staircase to lead them down from the deck, and Seungcheol turns to take one last good look of his hometown. 

_ Call you later, Mom. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> woot here's the explanation that everyone saw coming u are all so smart!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! even tho it's literally in the tags of the fic but u kno what literally WHATEVER i didn't know that you could update tags along the way but i'm stupid and i dont know things i go to college so that i LEARN things i'm goign to go on a tangent if i dont stop now i hope you enjoyed the chapter and if u are also on spring break right now that you are enjoying your break!
> 
> hmu @bigcaratfool on twitter i am taking au ideas and requests rihgt now in my curious cat i am very much wanting to write a boogyu so if you have any spare boogyus i will vore them


	9. Memories Made at the Midway

Seungcheol is pretty sure that he couldn’t have picked a more cliche place to have a first date than here. Well, there’s Disneyland, but that’s sort of an anniversary ordeal. It’s also become a stupid amount of money, and some odd big event to flaunt rather than a good way to get to know somebody or check compatibility. Seungcheol would rather die by self strangulation than seem  _ that _ interested in Joshua. He can’t risk it even if he is.

The inner Kim Mingyu lingering in Seungcheol’s brain mocks him, saying  _ there’s no way you can make him run away from you on a date!  _ in that raspy voice of his, which doesn’t seem like it can be so scathing with sarcasm until it  _ is. _

Seungcheol clutches at his own hair, messing with it. Now isn’t the time to think about his stupid  _ friends!  _ It’s time to  _ focus!  _

So, in a mix of wanting to seem like he gave a good shot at planning, but not wanting to be too overbearing with activity, he chose the pier. Santa Monica was nice, and Seungcheol enjoyed the feeling of being on an old pier (despite the constant upgrades, renovations, and tourists). The old wood of the boardwalk gave him an exciting sense of terror, despite being completely safe. Almost like the very man he would be meeting here! Great. 

Seungcheol looks down at his phone. He’s gotten there pretty early, mostly to give himself time to run if he chickens out. Because even though he knows now, through a series of nightly text messages that kept him up far too late, that Joshua is relatively harmless. He’s really nice, he’s got an odd sense of humor, but he’s still really cool. It’s just that he’s never actually spent time with him despite their practically constant contact over the last few weeks, and now that he’s thinking about it… 

_ How the fuck do you impress a demigod on a date? _

Initially, he had this cute little daydream of winning Joshua a plushie by showing him his absolutely sick aim at one of those carnival game stands, or perhaps through winning tickets through a skeeball machine at the old school arcade, but he definitely wanted to impress him somehow. Instead, sitting at a bench by himself watching people  _ definitely  _ younger than him walk past, he’s stuck worrying himself sick. It’s possible that Joshua has more powers that he just doesn’t talk about. He’s a Cupid after all… 

_ What if he has better aim? Do they have to practice the whole bow and arrow thing? Fuck, he could’ve just teleported us straight into Disney! _

Feeling shit out of luck and a bit too downtrodden before the date even has even started, he gets up from the slightly disrepaired bench to stare out at the water below, as cloudy and as blue-green as ever. The sea here never really seemed perfectly blue, but that was just part of the Californian charm, right? 

He stands there for a while, just hoping he won’t mess it up. He doesn’t really get why Joshua agreed to go with him anyways, but he really hopes it isn't just because he’s lonely in a way Seungcheol could probably never truly relate to. He’d like to have a little bit more than that going for him, and if impressing him with minuscule feats of skeeball scores is all he can do, isn’t it worth a shot? 

“Well, you’re here early.”

Seungcheol has a full body reaction, his whole back stiffening as he yelps out and turns around to get a look at his assailant. It’s hardly any surprise that Joshua stands behind him, looking as neat and as perfect as ever. He’s got a gently grin on his lips, or maybe it’s a bit mischievous? God, Joshua is so hard to read. But he’s stupidly gorgeous and that makes up for it in Seungcheol’s short-circuiting mind. 

“Oh, ha,” Seungcheol says, attempting to save face with a smile, “Well, you know me. I’m early.”

Joshua’s face is entirely unmoving, and Seungcheol can feel cold sweat forming at the back of his neck when he realizes that what he said was entirely weird.

“So, Santa Monica at sunset, huh? That’s not bad.” Joshua tries again, and in Seungcheol’s eyes, he looks more like a saint now than ever before. He doesn’t say anything though, making a fool of himself again. Joshua puffs out a nervous little huff, finally looking a bit more human.

“Hey, we match.” Joshua says, pointing at Seungcheol’s shirt.

Seungcheol looks down at his own chest, as if he had forgotten he was even wearing clothes. They were essentially wearing the same thing— jeans and a striped long sleeved t-shirt. The only difference is that Joshua’s shirt was green-and-white striped and Seungcheol’s was black-and-white striped. 

“Oh, that’s annoying.” Seungcheol says, unable to hold back a grin as he looks back to his date. 

His mind blanks for the third time. He can’t think of anything. It’s like he’d set the file cabinets within his brain on fire and there’s absolutely nothing left in there. 

He blinks, forcing himself to say something. Anything. 

“You changed your hair again.” 

“Oh,” Joshua says, a hand reaching up to touch a strand of his hair, now golden brown, perhaps bordering on an orange tint. “Yeah. I was wondering when you’d point it out! That’s just something I can do.” 

Joshua looks over both of his shoulders quickly, scanning for anyone staring, and turns back to Seungcheol with a little smirk settled on his lips. His hair fades into a deep brown, like milk chocolate, before returning to that bright color. Seungcheol gapes, and sincerely wishes he had that sort of ability before going through bleaching hell in order to go silver last year. It was certainly a  _ choice _ , but he did get hit on a lot back then, so maybe it wasn’t all that bad. 

“You know, I was thinking; what other cool things can you do? Teleportation is pretty cool.” Seungcheol asks, standing upright in an attempt to make himself seem a bit more attractive. 

“I can do The Worm pretty well, if I do say so myself.” 

“Hm. It’s probably best if you keep that to yourself.” 

Joshua laughs, and the laugh lines around his lips squish up towards his nose that make it look extra round and kissable. 

_ Fuck _ , Seungcheol thinks,  _ I’m a weak man. _

“So, wanna walk around?” He asks, trying his best to give them something to do so that this doesn’t all tank. 

“Nah, I just want to stand here all night,” Joshua nods his head in the direction they’d be going and shoves his hands into his pockets casually, shifting to walk around with Seungcheol. 

It’s the same pier as always, and Seungcheol has only lived here for a few years, but it’s a sight he’s grown used to. The handful of rides, the food stands and the pop radio station playing from weather-worn speakers hoisted up onto tall poles. However, it seems like Joshua is the one leading them around the wide boardwalk, just a half step ahead of Seungcheol’s stride.

He’s never been too great at first dates. He’s never really had a date that’s been categorized as a catastrophic failures, but it’s that weird, looming sense of awkwardness where Seungcheol just doesn’t know what to do with himself that makes him choke up. It’s a weird state of wanting to be close to someone, wanting to break through certain boundaries and really  _ interact _ , but first dates are when the boundaries are drawn clearly in the sand, and figuring out where those lines may lie is undeniably the most difficult part. It makes him feel unusually introverted, afraid to make conversation or make any moves, so even stepping forward to walk beside Joshua feels like a feat of courage. He worries too much, but he’s sick of listening to himself think already, so he picks up his pace a little to walk beside Joshua, flashing him a smile that the other immediately returns, as if it were as natural to him as the sun setting in the distance.

After that, the kitschy theme of the pier helps to mellow things out, as the perfect, movie-set like atmosphere of the Pacific Park amusement area brings more excitement. When the colorful themed lighting turns on and stars start to speckle the sky, it’s like Joshua lights up too, which makes it easy to be high in spirits and hyperactive. It’s so simple to sync up with him, too. All it takes is one competitive jab during a midway game of ring toss to make things go haywire, but in the best way possible. Joshua, the scrawny armed tool, slapped his chest and opened his arms, as if welcoming a fight, and Seungcheol was eager to give him just that.

During skeeball, the two repeatedly thump elbows, trying to throw each other off of their respective rhythms. While playing the long range basketball game, Joshua kept shouting random numbers at Seungcheol, making him lose his count and restart several times, to which Seungcheol was very tempted to throw a ball at that pretty face of his. Even when playing that spray-gun game to make a starfish reach the top of the board, Joshua used the tip of his finger to deflect the quickly shooting water out from the gun, splashing a sharp spray of water directly into Seungcheol’s face and stealing a win.

It gets Seungcheol riled up, firey with competitive spirit and ready to kick his ass at any given moment, but it really pays off when he channels his energy into another round of free-throws in the basketball game, He won a big pikachu plush doll, and Seungcheol finally had physical proof of his victory against Joshua. He lorded over him for a little bit, declaring himself the winner of the night, but handed it off to Joshua anyway. The look on his face was entirely worth it, a look of mild shock that devolved into a lopsided grin and pink cheeks. He hid behind the giant globular shape of Pikachu’s overstuffed head, but that little glimpse of weakness was enough. 

After that, the two agreed to call it a truce and get something to eat. Seungcheol did the honor of grabbing them a table-- which wasn’t too hard of a task considering the moderately populated state of the pier-- but the table did require a bit of cleaning. Nothing that a napkin couldn’t fix, but the mysterious sticky substance kept him busy as he waited for Joshua’s return. Soda? Water? Some sort of bodily fluid? Who knows.

Joshua returns a little bit later with two whole servings of fries, and while it’s certainly not good for his health, he’s got his fingers on a fry before Joshua even completely sits down. 

“Would you believe me if I said I haven’t been out like this since I was like, seventeen?” Joshua speaks, striking up conversation. It’s interesting enough to make Seungcheol pause momentarily mid-bite in his process of shoving an overly long fry into his mouth.

”Whew, really?” Seungcheol whistles, “That’s a long ass time.” 

“Yeah, well, Cupids don’t really get their own dates. They just keep track of how other people’s dates are going.” Joshua pops a fry onto his mouth, and the way he looks down for a flash of a second makes him look so soft and shy. “It feels weird to be on one after so long.” 

“Weird as in bad weird, or good weird?” 

“Good weird. You really stress out easy about stuff like this, huh?” 

“I can’t really help it,” Seungcheol’s brain flashes to a pick up line, bright and annoyingly fluorescent, like a neon light that isn’t giving him any other option. He hesitates, but decides on going for it as quickly as he thinks about it. “Pretty boys stress me out.” 

Joshua smiles wide, bringing a tight fist up to his face to hide a bit of bubbly laughter. 

“Ugh,” He cringes, even though he still smiles, “Did you just insinuate that you think I’m pretty?” 

“I mean, yeah. Why else did you think I’d ask you out?” Seungcheol raises his brows, using a bit of sarcasm as a deflection to his own embarrassment. 

“I don’t know. I kinda thought you were just doing this for me.” Joshua lowers his hand, taking another fry, but he doesn’t meet Seungcheol’s gaze. 

“Why would I do that?” 

Joshua’s eyes flit to Seungcheol for a second, looking almost a little bit guilty, for really no reason. 

Seungcheol reaches for Joshua’s hand, laid down flat on the table, and sets his hand atop of it. He curls his fingers inward, resting upon Joshua’s palm, and running his thumb across the smooth skin of his hand. His palm is a bit cold, perhaps a little clammy and sweaty, and that’s when Seungcheol realizes that they’re in the same boat. They’re equally nervous, not sure exactly what they’re doing, but doing it anyway. 

“I’m doing this because I’m drawn to you, Shua.” 

Joshua opens his mouth, and it clicks shut quickly, and Seungcheol can practically see the words getting caught in Joshua’s throat as the tips of his ears redden. 

Joshua’s hand tightens a little bit against Seungcheol’s. With his free hand, he rubs his nose with the back of his hand. 

“You’re the first guy to call me that.” He says, his voice impossibly gentle as he speaks breathlessly.

Seungcheol leans over the table, a wide smile blooming on his face as he begins to tease.

“Oh? Do you like it? Did I hit a sensitive point?”

“Bullseye, Seungcheol. Now please don’t say it again unless you want me to die.” 

Joshua pops a fry into Seungcheol’s mouth, and he nearly chokes, retracting his hand to bend over the table and shield his face to keep his expression of a choking cat to himself. Joshua laughs, and Seungcheol can’t bring himself to be upset. It’s like a song he’d never heard before. Maybe it’s his new favorite melody.

The two simply eat and chat for a while, undisturbed by the bustle of the pier. Eventually, when the pile of fries has been decimated and the breeze picks back up, the two decide to walk around the pier again. They don’t play any games, they simply walk around and people watch for a bit, with Joshua stopping once to buy himself some overpriced candy. However, there’s just once difference from earlier that makes Seungcheol’s heart threaten an attack at any given moment. Joshua was holding his hand.

It was a loose grip, with fingers merely resting over each other and palms brushing every few moments, but it’s enough to keep Seungcheol’s heart rate at an alarming speed and his thoughts racing faster. When Joshua’s hands weren’t slicked with nervous sweat, they were incredibly warm and even larger than Seungcheol’s own. It makes him feel a certain type of way. 

For all intents and purposes, Seungcheol has always been a “man’s man”, meaning that there shouldn’t be another man out there who loves other men as much as he does, in both a platonic and romantic way. He likes sports a lot. He enjoys watching soccer and hockey and football and wrestling, he enjoys watching displays of masculinity like that. He also really likes making out with other men. It’s just that he usually goes for the pretty boy types, pretty boys that are soft and look like flowers bloom on the paths they walk. Pretty boys that look like they were made to be admired. For lack of a better term, boys that seem like they would appreciate having the baton taken from them. 

Yet, Joshua’s large hands make Seungcheol feel like he just wants to curl up into a ball so that he could be held by them better. It’s different. It’s something Seungcheol definitely doesn’t mind at all. 

They spend a bit more time at the pier, at least until the crowd around them seems to be less of families and stray teenagers and more adults looking for a unique way to spend a Saturday. The scene becomes a little too familiar, and Joshua suggests they just chill at the beach for a bit. Wanting to hear Joshua’s gentle voice a bit more clearly without his own terror warping it, he agreed. It proved to be a good decision. Joshua was a pretty good storyteller, and he had lots of good ones to tell. Stories of dates he’d watched, or embarrassing little morsels from time of his own, make him a pretty compelling narrator. 

They sit atop the cold sand, watching as the chilly waves of the night wash along the shore. Seungcheol had taken off his shoes to bury his toes in the sand, wiggling them when he wanted to give himself something to be distracted by. Joshua periodically took talking breaks to take a swig of his strawberry pop rocks, harsh crunching sounds and crackles occasionally coating his words. 

Seungcheol wasn’t uncomfortable anymore. Not in the slightest, and as Joshua kept talking he found himself staring at the way the other sat as if he were a statue atop a pedestal. His knees were drawn up to his chest, arms hanging lazily over his knees, and his face lit up by the moon hanging above them as he craned his neck upwards to stare at the sky. For some reason, he felt the need to memorize Joshua’s features, like the round tip of his nose and the point of his chin. He’d kept in mind the whole time that Joshua wasn’t just some  _ guy _ , but it didn’t really hit him that the demigod even breathed in a way that seemed celestial. 

Joshua tips back some more pop rocks, leaving his mouth open to let the annoying sound out, and turns to Seungcheol with a grin that’s become familiar. 

“I don’t have to be a god to know that you’re staring at me, Cheol.” 

Seungcheol huffs out a nervous laugh, his hand coming up to rub the stiffness from his own neck. Before he can open his mouth to say something, Joshua speaks again, a bit more mock and tease in his tone. 

“You really think I’m that pretty?” 

Seungcheol hates this. His body feels like it’s one huge bag of pop rocks. His stomach churns with bubbles of nervousness, like the bubbles of carbon dioxide within the candy, that choose now to resurface. His heart keeps beating out of time like one of the rocks that’’s got saliva on it that’s making it  _ pop-pop _ like that. His whole body tingles with energy that he didn’t have before like a child on a sugar high. If not for his weight keeping him on the surface, he’s sure he would’ve rocketed into orbit by now.

“I mean, fuck, do you think that you’re not?” Seungcheol manages, despite his internal organs threatening failure. 

“No, I know I’m handsome. I just didn’t think you were so weak.” 

Seungcheol clutches his chest and jolts like he’d been shot. 

“Do you have to read me like that?” He splutters. 

Joshua giggles and throws back another swig of his candy. 

“Sorry. Peace offering?” 

He offers out the black bag of what’s essentially just carbon dioxide and sugar, and Seungcheol briefly wonders why Joshua even likes this stuff, but he takes it anyway and pours some into his mouth. 

It’s not bad. He likes the strawberry flavor on his tongue, and he thinks that the flavor must be what makes the candy so good, and not necessarily the sensation in his mouth that echoes the processes of his body. 

_ Joshua probably tastes like strawberry right now. _

In the process of bringing the bag back down, ready to give it back to the other and brush off the thought of Joshua’s lips, there’s a feeling on his cheek that most definitely isn’t the seabreeze. 

It’s lips. Joshua’s lips, to be exact, and Seungcheol freezes in place as his brain gives absolutely no output. 

“Thanks for seeing me.” Joshua whispers. “It really means a lot.” 

A few seconds later, Seungcheol’s brain starts to show signs of life again, and he nods. 

“Of course. I wouldn’t think that you’re good looking if I didn’t see you.”

“Point taken.” Joshua winks, taking back his bag. 

Seungcheol fights for the bag back, nearly tackling his date into the sand just to have it again. He doesn’t think Joshua would try a move like that again, but hell, if that flavor brings back the feeling of Joshua’s lips on his cheek then he wants it again. 

Because Seungcheol really,  _ really  _ likes pop rocks now. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SORRY.. I MEANT TO POST THIS... LAST WEEK... BUT I GOT.... DISTRACTED................................... APOLOGIES..... 
> 
> shout out 2 my friend theo who doesn't interact w kpop at all but still proofread this chapter for me! i kiss you!
> 
> hope u enjoyed this cute lil insert fluff chapter before i get back into plot stuff
> 
> catch me @bigcaratfool on twitter :)


	10. Seungcheol's Soulmate

As those moments of “firsts” pass by, slow and stiffly awkward, yet dizzying and exciting at the same time, life goes by far too fast. Seungcheol can remember each of his and Joshua’s firsts pretty well, mostly because he feels that if he gets off of his game, Joshua might have his father come and smite him for his love crimes. 

Their first kiss was on their second date, which was really just an impromptu run in with each other when Seungcheol decided to go see a movie by himself. Seungcheol had dressed like he was going to make a day out of a robbery, with a black cap and a hoodie to cover himself up, just because he was  _ that _ embarrassed about going to see some cheesy summer romance flick by himself. He didn’t really want to go see it, but he thought that he should brush up on his romancing skills since he was going to date a cupid. Not too far into the movie, he noticed that Joshua, just a few seats away from him, was not so discreetly staring at the couple two rows in front of him. Seungcheol moved over a few seats to sit beside his mentally coined “almost boyfriend," to which Joshua almost threw hands, but when Seungcheol took off his hat all was well and right in the world. Joshua allowed him to sit with him, and after the third, far too long kiss scene of the movie, Joshua was biting at his lips and Seungcheol just couldn’t take it anymore. He probably should’ve waited, which Joshua chastised him later about it, but it was good enough to garner a few more kisses when they decided to just hang out together when Joshua wasn’t stalking anyone for his job anymore.

The first “I miss you” text was sent because Joshua had been traveling around incessantly for a few weeks, and it made it hard to make plans or even talk often. Seungcheol had gotten pretty used to it, and Joshua’s fairly constant selfies and texts helped him feel like he wasn’t usually halfway across the world. It was around 2 am on a wednesday night when Seungcheol got that text, up playing some video game because his eyes just wouldn’t stay shut. All it took was one simple “then come over” text in response for Joshua to pop in through Seungcheol’s bedroom door, and make it the first time Joshua spent the night. Nothing of note happened, nothing out of the realm of cuddling that they hadn’t already done, but Joshua’s sleeping face, trusting and calm and completely serene, meant more than a night of sex would have. It was the first time that Seungcheol really felt like Joshua trusted him. That was also the first time that Seungcheol really felt like he could really get somewhere with Joshua, that this could maybe be a serious sort of deal.

The first item that Joshua left at Seungcheol’s place was a comb. The first piece of clothing he stole was a hoodie. He was a little bit of a kleptomaniac, really, because things went missing from Seungcheol’s closet often. The first time Seungcheol hinted to his friends about there being somebody in his life in the romantic sense was after their second month of dating. It took him a while, because Joshua seemed a bit flighty at times, but he was confident enough to talk about him then. The first time Seungcheol acknowledged Joshua as his boyfriend was when he was introducing him to his friends, and not too long after that, it was the first time Joshua had said “I love you." That was the really big one. He said it after agreeing to go meet up with him at that same coffee shop that they had their first encounter at. 

Joshua was scared of saying it, scared of what it meant for him to have something like that when Cupids were supposed to just be observers and protectors of love. He talked way too much about it, completely giving himself away before he had even said the words. He had this whole speech, long and drawn out, about "love" being something unattainable for him, that he was always just going to be a bystander in other people’s love stories. Seungcheol knew that it was coming, having to cover his mouth with his hand as he intently listened, hiding a smile on his face while waiting for Joshua to just say it already. Joshua was twitching and nervous, his hands shaking against his to-go coffee cup that had probably gone cold by the time he finally mustered up the courage to just say those three small, yet revolutionary words. 

Seungcheol doesn’t like to talk about the way he teared up after Joshua finally said it. Joshua, on the other hand, does.

At this point, everyone in Seungcheol’s personal circle knew that Seungcheol pretty much cries after every time Joshua does something particularly romantic, because Joshua and Jeonghan get along in the scariest of ways and Jeonghan also has a pretty big mouth. So does Seungkwan. And Soonyoung. It makes Seungcheol kind of just want to die every time he has to hang out with his friends now, because someone is going to poke at his soft and fleshy heart even though he likes to act all tough-guy all the time (despite how much he clings on to his friends like they’re stuffed animals). 

Despite how much he gets teased, from both Joshua and his friends, he’s really happy. Practically anyone could see it. Maybe that’s why Jeonghan and Seungkwan are staring at him like that, with small, focused eyes and oddly serious lips. It’s like they know that he’s texting Joshua right now. 

Seungcheol puts his phone down on the table and squints back at his friends, making a mockery of their expression, playing like a cowboy in a movie about to have a stand-off with two of his biggest enemies. In a way, it’s sort of accurate. Seungkwan and Jeonghan never really stop being a pain.

“What?” He says after a few moments, finally having enough of the silent standoff, sitting up in his seat. 

“Nothing,” Jeonghan replies, raising his brows, “I was just thinking that it’s been a while now.” 

“A while since what?” Seungcheol says, raising a loaded finger gun in his defense. 

“Since you and Joshua started going steady. Six months, right?” Jeonghan continues, just resting his hand on his cheek like he doesn’t care about Seungcheol’s imaginary weapon. 

“Yeah, but why are you keeping count?” Seungcheol purses his lips, putting his hand down in favor of putting it to an actual use and grabbing his water bottle. 

Jeonghan looks down at Seungkwan, who turns his head up at Jeonghan and nods. Something, some sort of tenderness in his eyes giving away to Seungcheol that there’s something going on that he doesn’t know about. 

“We’re just… a little concerned, you know? It seems like you’re  _ really  _ getting serious about this guy,” Seungkwan says, as gentle as always, like the therapist that he probably could be. 

“Because I am?” Seungcheol huffs out a small, confused laugh, “What’s there to be concerned about?” 

There’s a moment in which neither Seungkwan or Jeonghan know what to say, what to start with, and Seungcheol sits back in his chair like a judge waiting for a plea bargain.

“Because I know you. You always say that you don’t care about soulmates and the like, but I really don’t want to watch you keep getting hurt. Joshua, like it or not, will probably have to leave some day for his soulmate. I’ve known you for the longest, Cheol, and I know that love matters to you more than you like to lead on,” Jeonghan says, reaching out to pat Seungcheol’s shoulder. 

Honestly, it’s a bit weird to have a former flame say something like this to him, when they had gotten into a relationship knowing it would end. Though, at the same time, if it were anyone  _ but  _ Jeonghan saying this, the credibility wouldn’t be as valid. Seungcheol said it often: why does it matter? It’s his choice to live this way, and he’s fine with it. He’s happy enjoying life as it happens. What good would it do for Jeonghan to worry about this  _ now _ ? What good would it do anyone, really? Even further, although his friends don’t know, Joshua is a cupid. From what Seungcheol has observed in these past few months, Joshua doesn’t have the time to think about a soulmate when he’s too focused on other people’s love lives.

“We just, you know--” Seungkwan pauses to take a breath, hesitant before speaking again, “Want you to think about things before you get into another tricky situation.” 

Seungcheol gives a quick clap and a laugh, rocking back in his seat.

“Oh, that’s  _ rich  _ coming from you, Mr. I-Know-Who-My-Soulmate-Is-But-I-Don’t-Want-To-Acknowledge-It.” 

He probably shouldn’t have said it like that, exceedingly mocking and a bit venomous, and he knows it immediately. Seungkwan’s shoulders deflate with discomfort and a little bit of hurt, his eyes darting away and towards the floor of the restaurant.

“You know that my situation is different,” Seungkwan mutters, his fingers brushing over his wrist as an act of comfort, running over his timer that’s been at zero for a few months now.

It  _ is  _ different, situationally, because Seungkwan already knows who his soulmate is. In fact, he’s been skirting around the situation with Mingyu for far too long. Even Mingyu knows about it at this point. A few months ago, on the same night that Seungcheol had introduced Joshua to his friends, Mingyu and Seungkwan got into a little bit of a spat, as per their usual antics. Yet, away from the eye of their friends, their timers had both hit zero when they had kissed, and it was never really spoken about between the two of them. Perhaps both of them are waiting for the other to say something. It’s complicated. Seungcheol only knew about it because Joshua  _ had _ to watch it happen, and could only really talk about his knowledge of it when Seungkwan decided to vent a few days later. 

But to Seungcheol, gradually becoming more well-versed in his knowledge of love, it doesn’t seem all that dissimilar. Love is complicated no matter what, is it not? Though situations may differ, because each human being roaming the planet is unique, one could align and sympathize with another person’s feelings from halfway across the earth.

In short: What’s the difference between Seungkwan denying the person he’s supposed to be in love with, and Seungcheol prolonging the  _ supposed  _ future with someone?

Seungcheol backs down, sighing and mumbling out a quiet but genuine apology. Seungkwan hears it, straightens up a little, looking up at Seungcheol in a way that makes him feel guilty.

“It’s fine,” Seungkwan says, swatting his hand and forcing a grin back onto his face. “We just… Want you to think about your future a bit more, yeah? Have a talk with Joshua about it soon. You’re a big boy. You can handle it.”

Seungcheol sighs again, which doesn’t seem to be a good enough response, because Jeonghan’s gentle expression of worry hardens into a line on his lips. 

“If you don’t, I’ll message Joshua about it instead.” 

Seungcheol hisses this time, throwing a glare at Jeonghan that the other already knows means  _ you win, asshole _ .

“Just give me time, okay? That’s a heavy topic.” 

Thankfully, the waitress comes by with dinner, and they don’t talk about it for the rest of the night. Even better, the moment that Seungcheol passes through the door of his own home, he gets an all-too familiar “let me come over!” message from his boyfriend. After a quick text back, the door opens up again, and there’s a pair of arms slowly wrapping around his back. 

“What’s up?” Joshua asks, mumbling softly into Seungcheol’s ear before pressing a small peck just below it. 

“What’s it look like?” Seungcheol responds, unable to hold back his sarcasm or the gummy smile that creeps up onto his face. 

“Like you just got back.” 

“Bingo.” 

Joshua giggles, a soft melody to Seungcheol’s Joshua’s-cute-giggle deprived ears, and allows his arms to fall. Seungcheol moves out of the way, and like routine, they make their own way onto Seungcheol’s sofa. Seungcheol flops down onto it with a grunt like an old man with weary bones, and Joshua smoothly glides onto it like a prince who must not be too rough with his royal asscheeks. 

“How was Bali?” Seungcheol asks, draping his arm over the edge of the couch, giving Joshua the space to lean into his side. 

“I was only there for a few hours. I also went to Manila and New Jersey. I’m tired now.” Joshua, predictably, does lean into Seungcheol’s side, scooting close and making himself comfortable. 

“Do you wanna just go lay down?” 

“Nah, I wanna enjoy a little bit of my night with you, before I have to wake up tomorrow and do the same thing again.” 

“Fair enough. How about a movie?"

Seungcheol looks down at Joshua, who feels the movement of his boyfriend’s head. Joshua moves to meet Seungcheol’s eyes, and like a comfortable animal, blinks slow. Seungcheol notes just how sleepy Joshua looks, little creases beneath the puffs of skin under his eyes that give away how run down the other actually is. 

“Sounds great to me,” Joshua says, sharing a comfortable, albeit tired, grin with Seungcheol.

He reaches to his usual spot where he keeps the remote, on top of the arm of the chair, and hands it to Joshua so he can choose whatever looks mildly interesting, but not so interesting that they actually watch it. It’s part of their routine; they’ll put on something to fill the air, but end up talking until one of them passes out without any regard to whatever is on screen. 

So far, the night seems par for the course. Joshua puts on some droning documentary series about social media, and proceeds to talk about his day, intermittently producing an insult about the documentary when the timing is good enough. Joshua is funny in a weird way-- the type of way that makes Seungcheol laugh ten seconds later after the joke has been made. It’s odd, but Joshua is a bit odd in general. Seungcheol thinks it’s charming, but that’s probably his heart talking. His heart tends to talk a lot lately. 

One episode bleeds into another, and Joshua continues to talk about a pair of soulmates that he helped out today. Apparently, it was one of Joshua’s favorite kind of days, the kind where he gets to play a more active role. He had to stop a man from boarding his flight, doing everything in his power to delay his way through the airport, so that he could run into his soulmate who came running for her flight just a moment too late. He did a lot, planting a metal pin in his pocket so he’d be searched through security, standing in front of him in line at a coffee shop to order the most ridiculous drink he could think of to fill up time, and finally “borrowing” the man’s luggage for just long enough to make him miss his flight by a second.

“It was a pretty good day,” Joshua says, his head now laid in Seungcheol’s lap, completely ignoring the television screen in favor of playing with one of his boyfriend’s hands, his fingers running along the creases and lines. 

It’s a moment of quiet, where Seungcheol feels no shame in allowing himself to stare. Joshua’s bangs are flipped up over his head, exposing his forehead and the concentration of his brow. 

“I’m not the type of cupid that can read palms, but I know that there’s a type of fortune telling that can tell you a little bit about your love life,” Joshua says, tracing his nail into one of Seungcheol’s deeper creases. It makes his hand twitch, a bit ticklish. 

“I don’t need to know about my love life. This is my love life right now,” Seungcheol replies, purposely lilting his words in a way that usually makes Joshua roll his eyes and sigh to stifle an audible cringe. 

“You don’t ever think about it though? Meeting your soulmate?” 

Seungcheol’s comfortable grin falls a little, and Joshua seems to notice the change. He wraps his hand around Seungcheol’s, laying their hands flat on his chest. Seungcheol sighs, long and hard. 

“Jeonghan talked to you already, didn’t he?” 

“No?” Joshua’s head tilts a little. “But now I’m curious.” 

_ Shit,  _ Seungcheol hisses at himself internally,  _ I gave myself away.  _

Joshua’s thumb rubs over the top of Seungcheol’s hand, comforting him through the smallest of actions. 

“He told me to talk to you seriously about all of this soulmate shit, and I really didn’t want to bring it up because it’s always a big mood killer, and I kind of wanted to make out with you tonight, which will be hard to do if either of us are sad.” 

“I mean, if it’s not anything bad, we’ll see about the making out part. Also, don’t try to call the most important part about my job  _ shit _ .” 

“Sorry.” 

“It’s fine.” Joshua reaches up with his free hand to touch Seungcheol’s chin, murmuring, “Talk to me.” 

Seungcheol can’t think of anything that he wants to do  _ less _ . However, he readies himself with a muted sigh and props his head up on a fist that rested behind the cushion of his couch a moment ago. 

“Jeonghan’s just worried that I’ll get hurt again when you find your soulmate, which literally can’t happen because--” 

“Yeah, cupids don’t have soulmates,” Joshua nods. “It’s more of my issue then.” 

“Huh?” Seungcheol blinks. 

“You know, when you inevitably find your soulmate, it’ll put me back at square one. But honestly, I think I’d be okay. Being loved by you for even this long would probably keep me going for the rest of my life.” 

Seungcheol really,  _ really _ wishes that Joshua didn’t say that. His words twist around his heart, constricting it like a snake closing in on its prey. The fact that Joshua says it with a grin is probably even worse. He’s definitely already thought about and accepted it, and Seungcheol just won’t take that.

“That won’t happen,” Seungcheol says, resolute, steady. 

“It will, and that’s fine.” Joshua’s hand spreads from Seungcheol’s chin to his cheek, caressing it gently. He takes in a deep breath, measuring it before speaking again. “I just… Is it okay with you if I look up who your soulmate is? I want to know that you’d be ending up in good hands.” 

“I don’t want you to," Seungcheol whispers, more watery than he’d like it to be. “Don’t.” 

Joshua’s hand leaves Seungcheol’s face, reaching downward into his own pocket, and Seungcheol grabs for Joshua’s wrist. Seungcheol’s eyes trained onto his lover’s face, watching as the smile on Joshua’s is disturbed by the urgency of the action. 

“There’s no point. I don’t have any indication of having a soulmate. Not when I was born, nor when I turned eighteen. There’s nothing.” 

Joshua blinks, and continues to shake his wrist from the other’s grip. 

“That’s not an issue. There’s thousands of people that believe they don’t have a soulmate. Everyone does, Seungcheol. That’s just more reason for me to look!” 

“Joshua, baby, I’m begging you not to. I don’t want to know.” 

“I won’t tell you.  _ I  _ want to know. I’m doing it for me, okay?” 

Seungcheol supposes that he can’t argue with that, so he just sits tight and waits for the moment that Joshua puts down his phone so they can resume their quiet night, that peace that he was craving so badly. But it doesn’t come. 

Joshua’s whole face hardens, his expression freezing. His eyes flick over his screen quickly again and again, and his whole face scrunches angrily to match the intensity within his eyes. 

“That doesn’t make sense,” Joshua mumbles. 

“What?” Seungcheol says, a loud sense of alarm rising within him. There’s white noise in his ears that he just can’t unhear. 

“There’s nothing there.” 

Suddenly, the white noise goes away. Seungcheol relaxes immediately, and he sighs with relief.  _ Liberation. _

“See? I told you. It’s fine. We won’t ever have to worry about that.” 

“No, Seungcheol, that’s not fine. That’s the furthest thing from fine.” 

Joshua sits up quickly, crossing his arms around himself and sitting back against the cushions of the couch as he throws his phone beside him, discarding it. 

“Why are-- why are you so upset? I told you, I’m okay with it.” Seungcheol's voice is soft, and he moves to turn to his side a bit, his hands hovering over Joshua’s stiff form. 

“This isn’t a matter of opinion. It’s not a thing you should be okay with. I don’t know how to explain it.”

Joshua never shows any sign of upset on his face. His expressions are always so gentle, bordering on muted until mania spreads across his expressions. A gentlemanly demeanor, Joshua had called it before. But this, this blatant expression of upset, has never happened before, and it… it scares Seungcheol, deeper than anything else. 

“Why?”

Joshua looks back at his boyfriend, fixing his eyes on the man that he’d allow himself to love so much. He moves to face Seungcheol completely, crushing one of his own legs in the process, and grabs both of his lover’s cheeks. 

“It means that you shouldn’t exist.” 

Seungcheol tries to register what the hell that even means, but he doesn’t have the time to really think about it. The tears welling up in Joshua’s eyes spring forth more need to action than his own thought process. He cups both of his hands over Joshua’s, cradling his fingers for all that they are worth, and to him, the world. Ten whole planets, for each finger, even.

“Seungcheol.” Joshua exhales out the name, just as a tear falls. Seungcheol tries to swipe it away desperately. “Please tell me you lied to me. You’re not human, are you? Tell me you lied. That you’re not a normal guy.” 

It’s a product of horrible timing, his body utterly betraying him as his throat closes up, not letting him speak a single word in response as he watches his love spill such bitter tears. 

“Seungcheol!” Joshua’s voice raises, just the slightest bit. 

“I-” He finally manages a reply reply finally manages with a croak, painfully saying, “I would never lie to you.” 

“Oh, god.” Joshua whispers it, closing his eyes. Two tears come with it, and Seungcheol doesn’t even possess the courage or the strength to wipe them away. All he can do is whisper his response.

“Does it mean something bad?” 

Joshua leans down, pressing his into Seungcheol’s chest, forcibly taking his hands from his face so that he can throw them around his lover’s torso. He buries his face there, and moisture starts to form on the fabric. 

“I don’t know.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> first off i would just like to say: my bad on not updating this for nearly a month the chapter started w a timeskip and i kind of loathe writing those and i had a hard time trying to make the timeskip enjoyable so i just Didn't work on it for a while
> 
> anyway last day of the semester is tomorrow for me, so i will probably be better at updating my fics because sUMMER 
> 
> thanx 2 me best friend again for always makin me feel safe and beta-ing this chappy
> 
> alright i hope u enjoyed <3 hmu on @bigcaratfool on twitter


	11. In the Wake of Romance

There’s a chime from Seungcheol’s phone that alerts him of a new voicemail. He sends a glare over at it phone, squinting at the brightness of it, beside the fact of him being in his well-lit living room. He’d normally click on the deny button without even really looking to see who’d been calling him -- a habit of a grumpy man -- but when he sees the name on his phone screen, his heart softens. 

Boo Seungkwan is definitely the type to call people for no reason, just to chat about his week or something shocking that had happened to him, or simply because he’s thinking about you. He’s a good friend like that, overly sentimental and sweet to the point of being too loving, like a grandfather. Maybe that’s why Seungcheol decides to pick up his phone and swipe on the little notification. 

“Seungcheollie!” Seungkwan’s voice is smooth as he lilts, loud enough to make Seungcheol turn down the volume slightly. The next second, though, his friend’s usual broad tone softens significantly, hesitant as he continues. 

“Hey, I know you don’t really want to be bothered lately, but I’ve noticed that you’ve even stopped checking the groupchat. I’m not gonna lecture you or anything, so don’t stop listening! We’re just making plans to go out tomorrow night, around 8pm or so, at the karaoke bar that Soonyoung and I really like. The whole gang is gonna be there, so, it would be really cool if you showed up. Think about it, okay? Hope to see you tomorrow.” 

The sound of rustling from Seungkwan peeling his phone away from his face and the tapping from him somehow missing the end call button twice before the voicemail actually finishes makes Seungcheol grin down at nothing but his wallpaper. Once a photo of him and Joshua, now a default one that he can’t be bothered to change again. His friends are too good to him. Still caring about him, even after about a month of silence. He didn’t really mean to become so withdrawn, it just sort of happened. After all, what else is he supposed to do after Joshua just disappeared on him?

Seungcheol has never really been ghosted before, despite how commonplace it is for people his age. It’s a new experience, and it stings like an open wound rather than a deep bruise he’d been dealt after other breakups. He’s the type of person who needs closure, needs something concrete in order to feel like he’s done all that he could. Even if he can’t be on good terms with his ex, he’d at least like to have a last word, a last  _ something _ , but he got none of that. Nothing. One night Joshua was in his arms, and the next morning, he was gone. 

Initially, he didn’t panic. He’d gone a few days without talking to Joshua before; he was probably just extra busy with his work. It was when a week had passed that Seungcheol started to worry, worry that something happened to Joshua halfway across the world and there was absolutely nothing he could do about it. After two weeks, Seungcheol told his friends to keep a lookout for Joshua, to let him know if they saw him anywhere. He couldn’t give them much more of a reason besides that they’d gotten into a fight and Joshua hadn’t been speaking to him, even if that was far from the truth. Yet, they never saw anything, and two weeks turned into four. Eventually, his friends stopped asking Seungcheol if there were any updates, and there truly wasn’t anything for Seungcheol to report on. None of his outgoing messages were opened, no calls were answered, and a little after a month, Joshua’s phone number had been disconnected. 

Joshua was gone, and that was it.

The worst part about it all is that Seungcheol doesn’t even have the capacity to feel anything about it anymore. In absence of the anger, of the betrayal and the hurt, of the worry and the sadness, there was just a black hole that sucked up anything that Seungcheol could even try to feel. He didn’t really want anything anymore, didn’t even want to talk to anybody, as he’s been deserted and doesn’t even have the capability to care.

With his head tossed over the edge of his couch, he stares at the ceiling and thinks about that night again:

_ A painfully average thursday night, as most of them tended to be, Seungcheol laid atop his bed, scrolling mindlessly on his phone. His phone lit up into a screen that had become all too familiar, a dimmed photo of Joshua staring off at the sunset: a candid photo. In perfect display was his caller ID, and it took only a second to pick up the call.  _

_ “Tell me I can come over,” Joshua spoke, unusually frantic, “right now.”  _

_ “Yeah, of course. What’s goi--”  _

_ The call abruptly ended, his screen flickering black, and then back onto his social media timeline. The sound of his front door opening and closing just as quickly alerted Seungcheol to stand, stumbling over on his tingling, sleeping feet. He was hardly able to register the time between his bedroom door opening, and his lover crashing onto him, knocking Seungcheol back down onto his bed anyway.  _

_ “This is driving me insane, Cheol, I don’t know what I should do.” Joshua pushed his words into Seungcheol’s chest, pressing his face there as he spoke. “Just hold me, please, just--”  _

_ Seungcheol obliged, easily, despite the odd angle. He wrapped his arms around Joshua’s shoulders, giving himself a double chin as he attempted to look down at his boyfriend. His thumbs press into Joshua’s tired shoulders, no doubt heavy from a long day of playing god, and a sniffle hangs in the air.  _

_ Joshua doesn’t usually cry. He only cries when it’s stupid to, like during a bad movie or over one of Soonyoung’s dumb jokes. On the rare occasion, when he’s drunk and his feelings are loose, he’ll cry then. Now, he’s crying entirely unprompted, which sends panic alarms firing through all of Seungcheol’s internal systems. Je showed no trace of it however, spreading his legs so that Joshua can curl up against his body, silently mulling over what to say.  _

_ He eventually gathered up the courage to talk, and though he prepares himself to speak with might and main, he whispers.  _

_ “What happened?”  _

_ “I can’t even talk about it.”  _

_ “God stuff?” _

_ Joshua sighed, long and hard, and pushed himself upward to nestle his head onto Seungcheol’s shoulder.  _

_ “I can’t say it. I’ll break some of these--” Joshua reached out his hand, and slapped it down against Seungcheol’s innocent bed, “--some of these stupid fucking laws!” _

_ Joshua doesn’t usually curse, either. He does, of course, but he reserves them for moments like this, moments where he has no choice but to pepper them in, eventually chucking the whole bottle into the metaphorical word salad. _

_ “Can you at least tell me vaguely? Is there a loophole where you can just skip the details?” _

_ “It’s about you.”  _

_ Seungcheol’s hands pause for a second, but he dutifully continues his work in smoothing down Joshua’s shirt over his back soothingly as soon as he can. _

_ “Shua, babe, I told you that you don’t have to worry about me.”  _

_ “I do. I do because it’s--”  _

_ Joshua bites his lip so hard that Seungcheol fears that he’s going to gnaw it off, so he slides his hand from Joshua’s back to cup his cheek, turning it so that it lays flat on his chest.  _

_ “--I can’t say it.”  _

_ “Then don’t. I won’t force you to.”  _

_ With a forceful hand, Joshua quickly dries the tears from his eyes, swiping them over his cheeks and wiping off the moisture on his bed as if his tears were some sort of acidic poison. _

_ “I just wanted to know what you were destined for.”  _

_ It’s Seungcheol’s turn to sigh, which he does, throwing his head back onto his sheets.  _

_ “I’m guessing it’s something bad, huh?” _

_ “It’s-- It’s complicated, but as things are now, it could be bad, potentially. For the rest of your life.” _

_ “...Okay,” Seungcheol shrugs, though it’s slowed by the pressure weighing against his body. “But it doesn’t directly affect me right now, does it?” _

_ “I can’t say.”  _

_ One of his heavy hands runs through his own hair, Seungcheol’s dark locks getting tangled on his thick fingers.  _

_ “Well,” he pops his lips, “I can see why you’re so frustrated.”  _

_ The air stills, and the white noise that had begun to develop during the silence made it so that Seungcheol couldn’t even hear the both of them breathing, naturally synching together due to the closeness of their bodies. It gave Seungcheol a bit of time to just deliberate, plan out the right words to say. It wasn’t often that he actually came up with them, a losing ticket in his mental lottery of sentences, but it was worth a shot. _

_ “Shua, you know I don’t care about what lies ahead. That’s not the path that I’m on right now. Right now I’m laying down with you, and that’s what matters to me most. You know that I’d do anything for you, right? I don’t plan on that changing any time soon. Joshua...”  _

_ Seungcheol used his elbows to prop himself up, adjusting slightly to truly look his lover in the eye. Joshua’s eyes were puffy, still a bit red and upset, but Seungcheol admired them nonetheless, thought that they were beautiful.  _

_ “I would do absolutely anything for you.”  _

_ Wanting to break the tension, he cracks a smile and speaks once more, “I’ll even go up there and fight that dad of yours, alright? I don’t care that he’s a god. I’ll post up and win. Two big, blazing fists, baby! What does he have? A bow and a few arrows? I’ve got this.” _

_ Joshua laughed, the kind that’s more of a breathy chuckle than a real laugh, but it’s an oasis, a sign that things can only go uphill. He adjusted himself to sit between Seungcheol’s legs and used his hands to yank Seungcheol up by the arms. If not for his well trained upper body strength, Seungcheol probably would’ve smacked his forehead directly into Joshua’s. He doesn't, and Joshua’s hands quickly move to cup both of Seungcheol’s cheeks.  _

_ He pulls him in for a kiss, the type that makes Seungcheol’s eyes flutter shut and picture nothing but fluffy white clouds and castles filled with puppies. Joshua’s lips are his own brand of heaven, always gentle and slow moving, sweet like his vanilla lip balm. Seungcheol’s hands rest upon both sides of Joshua’s waist, keeping his lover there as they share a kiss. It’s light, chaste, even, but it still tastes like being in love. _

_ “You don’t have to do all of that," Joshua whispered softly against Seungcheol’s lips, which the other attempted to chase immediately after, but Joshua pulled back even further, getting up to stand. “I think I’m gonna go.” _

_ “So soon?”  _

_ “Yeah. I’ve got something to do. I just needed to be with you.”  _

_ “I’ll walk you out, then.” _

_ Seungcheol forced himself up with a small grunt like always, as if he’s aged far passed what he actually was, and does his boyfriend the service of walking him to the door. They share one last little peck, and before Joshua sets his hand on the handle he turns around. Their noses nearly brush together again, and Seungcheol leans back. Joshua stared him directly in the eye, unmoving. _

_ “I love you so much.”  _

_ It felt unusually heavy, a sort of gravity to his words that made Seungcheol feel like he was going to be knocked backward onto his ass in a complete knockout move. None of that happened, so he simply grinned and leaned forward to press one last peck to Joshua’s forehead. _

_ “I know. Go get some rest, Shua.”  _

_ With a comfortable breath out of his nose, he pulled away and gave his lover one last smile before allowing Joshua to open the door. He was gone just mere seconds later.  _

  
  


There was nothing Seungcheol could even do about it now. He just had to accept the bitter feelings and move on. He’d done all that he could, and at this point, when it all stopped actively tormenting his every waking moment, he had deluded himself into being fine with it. 

Closing oneself off from all social activity and only really eating when necessary doesn’t really seem like being fine, though.

_ I should go out tomorrow, _ He thinks, but he still doesn’t respond to Seungkwan’s voicemail.

Despite the weight in his bones, as miniscule a weight as sand in an hourglass, yet with just as much meaning in which such small grains represent, he drags himself out of his bed and even further. He still hasn’t decided on going out with his friends, as his social battery seems to be perpetually drained just by daily living and his negative mood, but he needed to go get groceries. He’d been primarily keeping himself fueled with takeout meals on the way home from work, or ordering in when he doesn’t have much of a reason to leave his apartment, which resembles more and more of a rat’s hideaway with each passing day. 

Doing something productive would hopefully be the first step out of that hole he’d dug himself when he couldn’t come to grips with his own pain. He motivates himself by creating a simple checklist: Groceries first. Friends later. Maybe. If he feels like he’s up to it.

By the time he has half a cart full of essentials and a struggling wallet’s worth of snacks, he still hasn’t made up his mind. How could he, anyway? He’s got more pressing matters on his hands. Why consider a much needed dose of social interaction when he’s trying to decide between the soap with the pissed off bear on it, or the soap with the kraken on it? He winds up staring incredulously at the bottles for an absolutely wasteful amount of time, and the only thing that pulls him out of his thought process is the gentle clearing of somebody’s throat. 

“Oh, sorry,” Seungcheol mumbles, taking a step backward for the sake of being civil, which goes out of the window mere seconds later. 

Rendered completely silent through his stunned shock, he stares at the side of Joshua’s face as his eyes scan through each brand label. His eyes don’t seem to actually register anything, he's just genuinely… looking. He’s dressed in a pair of jeans and a shirt, no nametag or apron in sight, and he’s just there. Existing. 

Seungcheol, knowing already what brand Joshua uses, simply reaches over Joshua’s shoulder to hand him the bottle. He uses things that smell fresh, like clean cotton laundry on breezy spring days. Bullshit like that. 

Joshua takes the bottle from Seungcheol’s hand, eyebrows scrunched together as he pulls away in a look that could be described as nothing but confusion. For some reason, that makes Seungcheol so  _ instantly _ mad. 

“Are you  _ kidding _ me?” Seungcheol speaks to keep from seething, heat rising through his body like a thermometer. 

“...Thank… you?” 

Joshua’s voice is like a cool wave over blistering sands. It’s refreshing and soft, a gentle wash over coarse grain. 

“Is that  _ all  _ you can say?” 

“...Thank you… for the soap?” 

Seungcheol stares at Joshua, wide-eyed and desperate, only to receive blank blinking right back at him.

Joshua rolls his eyes and takes a step away, and Seungcheol immediately makes a grab at Joshua’s arm. With just a small measure of strength, he yanks Joshua back into place, and makes a grab for his other arm. His grip tightens as the other tries to squirm away, but to no avail. Seungcheol is quick with his words, making Joshua freeze in place. 

“Joshua Hong, where the hell have you been? Do you know how fucking worried I’ve been? You dropped off of the face of the earth just to come see me again in a goddamn soap aisle? What’s gotten into you? Why would you just  _ leave? _ ”

“Dude-- wait, what? I dont-- I don’t know what you’re talking about?” 

Joshua doesn’t do much to get Seungcheol to loosen his grip. All it takes is one shove, and Seungcheol has backed away, his strength wiped from him immediately. 

“So that’s it? I’m just a  _ dude _ now?”

Joshua turns slightly, his face warping with aversion, “I don’t even know you, man. Go get some help, there’s a quickcare right across the street.” 

Seungcheol croaks, his mind scrambling in all sorts of different directions as he tries to come up with something to say, but all that comes out is a forlorn plea. 

“I missed you so much. Please don’t do this to me.” 

Joshua simply picks his basket up from the floor, thrown aside in the sudden confrontation. 

“Shua,” His heart sinking into his stomach, Seungcheol tries again for one last time, his voice breaking as his heart continues to weigh him down.

Joshua would always easily melt when called that name. His lips would curl up into a grin no matter what, and if he could, he’d comfortably lean forward for a little bit of contact. Now, he only throws a scornful look before turning away and hurriedly stepping out of view, further and further from Seungcheol’s grip. 

Alone once more, Seungcheol can’t decide what to do with himself, unsure if he should break down, run after Joshua, or continue on with his life. Joshua was able to do so pretty easily.

He can’t help but replay it all in his head as he settles behind his cart and walks away.

There’s not a single doubt in his mind that he wasn't mistaken. There’s only one Joshua Hong in this world; his features are absolutely incomparable. No one else has his button nose, or his porcelain smooth skin, or his overly plumped yet entirely natural lips. Joshua looks like he’s a gift from a god, and hell, he is! Seungcheol was absolutely smitten with him, and after seeing him again he knows that he still is completely in love with every little sparkle in his eyes and every faint mole on his face. Didn’t Joshua feel the same way? 

His thoughts act like a weight on his body, and soon enough, he finds himself staring longingly at the endless bottles of liquor displayed near the checkout registers. However, he knows that he’s better than that, to drink his sorrows away alone. A drink does sound good though, something to drown out his inner turmoil and numb the pain that comes with it.

It’s then he decides that he doesn’t want to be alone anymore, aimlessly swiping his goods and bagging them. He can’t handle coming back to an empty apartment after being so easily tossed aside for a second time. He needs to go out. He needs to, for just a couple of hours, live unshackled by heartache.

Luckily, he’s been given a key to his freedom already.

Somehow, his feelings of desperation had morphed into determination to fuel his fires. The flames lick hot beneath his skin as the hours pass, with no sign of extinguish. He leaves the shelter of his home -- now more of a holding cell rather than a place of comfort -- over to the most unlikely of sanctuaries. 

Dad-friend label be damned. His policy of equal alcohol intake to brain function ratio shall be completely abandoned. He’s on a mission to get as plastered as he can while his friends are nice enough to get him pity drinks. Maybe he’ll take another picture to set as his wallpaper just to get that damn factory default one unburned from his retinas.

The overly tinted glass door of the bar pushes through easily, the little bell hanging atop the door closer ringing silent in comparison to the booming tune inside. The party has already begun, it seems, with a tipsy girl seizing the karaoke machine in the far back with as much pluck as an elderly lady in a church choir. Most seats at the bar are filled, and the occupants are notably not his friends. However, a burst of raucous laughter quickly directs him to a booth near the vintage brick wall that covers the left half of the building. Even from behind, Seungcheol easily recognizes the oddball group with multicolored tufts of hair, far too loud for just one table, as his trustworthy pals. 

He makes his way over with a confident grin, and as his face is lit up by different hues of color, someone finally recognizes him. Seungkwan’s eyes go wide, and he whips his head over to the side, mouthing “He’s here!” as conspicuously as possible while slapping Soonyoung’s arm rapidly, who turns and slaps Jeonghan’s, who instinctively hits him back. Seokmin’s laugh just gets louder, leaning into Mingyu as he laughs at Soonyoung’s expression of shock and hurt.

“You’re alive!” Jeonghan shouts, raising his glass up at Seungcheol. By the look of the vibrant liquid that sloshes out of his cup, Seungcheol knows exactly what sort of poison he’s in for tonight.

“He came out!” Mingyu joins with a can of his own, though it looks like he’s the designated driver for tonight, stuck with soda.

“Actually, I came out a few years ago.” Seungcheol settles next to Mingyu, who seems to fold up into half his size as he scrunches his shoulders to make more room in the already overcrowded booth.

Seokmin, laughing impossibly hard at such an  _ easy  _ joke, flings out his arm. He nearly hits Mingyu square in the nose with his elbow, just to hold his hand out for a high five to Seungcheol. The grimace that settles on Mingyu’s face is enough to warrant a return, and Seungcheol slaps and shakes Seokmin’s hand in high spirits. 

“Damn, how long ago did you guys get started?” 

“Not long, Seokmin’s only had one drink," Soonyoung shrugs. “But he’s already set.” 

Seokmin giggles, and Jeonghan nudges his lover with a smitten expression on his face. Seungcheol almost feels a bit smitten, too. It’s a cute laugh. 

It would be hard to be in a bad mood around such lively guys. Coupled with good booze, it isn’t long until Seungcheol has cast away the weight on his shoulders and set his mind free. They make him laugh like he hasn’t in weeks, to the point that he cries with laughter rather than salty, sad tears. The night is nearly perfect when the table decides to control the karaoke machine, and it’s not like anyone else wants to follow after an act like a duet from Seungkwan and Seokmin with an additional Soonyoung. Even if they’re just screwing around, screaming into the microphones and repeatedly nearly breaking the tambourines, it’s a sight that wouldn’t be traded for anything else. 

Yet even with such a rowdy group of mates, there’s something that tugs at Seungcheol’s ear. Literally. He keeps turning over his shoulder to see the asshole that yanks on his earlobe, but there’s nothing. At first, it seemed more like an inch or a phantom feeling, but as the hours trickle on, it seems more immediate, harder. 

“Outside," something whispers, for the first time all night. It doesn’t sound like a voice he knows.

Seungcheol turns his head, over his shoulder, but slow due to inebriation. 

“Why d’ya keep looking that way?” Seungkwan mumbles hoarsely, worn out by fervent karaoke. 

“Nothin’, I just… Nothin’,” Seungcheol shrugs. 

“I think I should start getting you guys home...” Mingyu starts to speak, but Seungcheol doesn’t hear the other half of what he’s saying. 

“Now,” it repeats. 

“Gotta piss first,” Seungcheol stands abruptly, already making his way to the bathroom as best as he can manage. He gets there, but before he can push open the door, he feels another tug on his ear. 

“This way.” 

Seungcheol squints at nothing but the air, unsure if he’s  _ that _ drunk, or if he’s actually hearing things. Without thinking, he takes the chance, walking further down the short hallway to the back entrance. 

He opens the door, following further outside, only to find nothing but an alleyway. 

_ Nothing here after all,  _ he thinks with a shrug.

He turns back towards the door, reaching out for the handle to pull it open, but it flings out into his face with such a force that it knocks his drunk ass over. 

It’s not the force of the door that knocks him out. It’s the way that the back of his head crushes against concrete that does. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whaddup yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa'll 
> 
> so if u aren't following my twitter (@bigcaratfool) you might have been thinking "ey why the fic get shorter" i noticed that i could literally just combine 3 chapters into one so that it had more substance and was probably more interesting that way so yEAH next chapter is the last one (sorry) but i honestly think that the fic reads a lot better this way!!! anyways i hope u enjoy this chapter!!!!!! thank u very much for reading as always!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i took double the time writing this than i should've bc i kept rewriting this over and over bc i couldn't get it RIGHT but now i think it is good and i hope you think that it is good too!!!!!! lov u


	12. Unemployed

When Seungcheol comes to, there’s nothing but white, purely blinding and radiant white light, the center of his vision somehow brighter than the rest of the space of white he’s found himself existing in. He blinks, just to check if he can, and finds solace in the blackness that his eyelids can offer. There’s no shadow, no motion, just white.

“I have heard what happened--” A voice speaks, booming yet soft, a binaural sensation of both a masculine voice in his left ear, and a feminine in his right, “--to the seventh child of Eros.”

Seungcheol opens his mouth to speak, but nothing comes out. Frankly, it doesn’t even feel like he’s breathing. But it doesn’t hurt.

“It’s quite comedic; there’s billions of people on the planet, and you two still found each other, despite being placed on opposite sides of the earth at birth; that Joshua, having made a decision completely rewriting the purpose of his existence, had become an extraordinary being.” 

The voice dims, and it whispered breathily and close into Seungcheol’s right ear.

“And yet, he decided to sacrifice the glory of divinity, humbling himself for a mere mortal.”

To his left, he hears it, the gentle melody within Joshua’s voice as he croaked.

“I understand, father, but I know that we deserve better than this empty fate. I thought that this way of life, acquiring celestial power to act on your will, would bring my existence a sense of purpose, to give me something to really live for. But... I was wrong. I found what I really wanted to live for all along. I wanted to live for the sake of happiness. He came and found me, and I know with every little piece of me, if I give everything up, that he’ll come and find me again. Because he--”

Wetness wells up in Seungcheol’s sight, and he turns to his left, trying to follow the voice of his beloved as it fades into nothing. 

“It’s time that I give this back to you. I apologize for having neglected doing this sooner.” 

All at once, the nerves in his wrist fire off signals that make him feel like it’s on fire. Twenty-four years of skin cells rapidly reform and peel off of a patch of red skin. Seconds pass, the molting of his skin stops, shedding one final thin film of skin until that near-white scar against his tanned skin is clear: A cursive-written name in light scars reads one name. Beneath that name, a set of numbers.

Joshua Hong

00:00:15:45:17

17...16… 15...14…

He’s got a  _ timer _ .

“Thank me with your happiness. It’s time for you to go.”

The whiteness fades into a gradual grey, and then black, as things start to get more noisy and as pain starts to pound mercilessly within Seungcheol’s skull. 

“--eol! Seungcheol!” 

“Holy fucking shit, look! That wasn’t there two seconds ago.” 

“Shh, wait, he’s coming to!” 

Seungcheol opens his bleary eyes to see Seungkwan beside him, rubbing at his own furiously, the wetness on his face exposing the fact that he’s been bawling. 

“I thought I killed you,” Seungkwan croaks, seemingly gags on his own voice, and sniffles, “Fuck, Seungcheol, I really thought I accidentally killed you!” 

Seungcheol tries to move, but groans instead, the pounding of his head trying to kill him for real before he can get any words out. 

“Thank god that Seokmin is a med student,” Jeonghan sighs, a hand resting over his chest. “If not for him here we would’ve already had your ass in an ambulance and in debt.” 

“Are you okay?” Seokmin says, his hand still on Seungcheol’s wrist. Seungcheol lifts his head slightly to look down. It’s still there. Joshua’s name, the timer-- it’s there. His head falls -- gently -- back against the ground.

“I am," Seungcheol croaks out. “What happened?”

Jeonghan sends a glare Seungkwan’s way, who shrinks to half his size just by scrunching his shoulders and pressing his hands together nervously. 

“Well, I was watching as Seungcheol said he was going to the bathroom, but I saw that his drunk ass was going the wrong way, so I decided to follow after him before he got arrested for pissing in an alley or something. But I accidentally clocked him in the face with the door and-- God, I’m so sorry!” 

“It’s-- It’s fine. I’m not mad.” Seungcheol closes his eyes, focusing on trying to get the pain raging through his brain to calm down. “I just want to get home.” 

Soonyoung gingerly scoops Seungcheol into his lap, propping his head up more comfortably.

Seokmin, all the while, has been holding onto Seungcheol’s wrist, making fish eyes at Jeonghan and Mingyu to  _ look at Seungcheol’s goddamn wrist that wasn’t like that a few minutes ago-- _

Mingyu squints at Seokmin, looks down, and promptly clasps his hand over his mouth in the most overly dramatic way possible. He reaches out, slapping Jeonghan on the arm until he too looks down and has to hold himself back from screaming by biting his lip. After blowing all of his energy out of his nose, he mutters, “Leave it. This is already too much for one night. He’ll see it tomorrow morning.”

Mingyu nods, looks over at Seungkwan beside him, observing the wetness and the regret plastered on his face, and sighs. 

“I’ll get a ride back home with him,” he starts, and turns away from Seungkwan to look back at their group, half sobered up and half still hyped up on being scared shitless. “I don’t have work tomorrow, so I’ll stay the night and keep you guys updated in case something happens.” 

“That sounds good,” Jeonghan nods. “I’ll pay for the ride.”

“Soonyoung, help me get him up,” Mingyu instructs, already bringing himself to stand. Soonyoung props Seungcheol up slowly, his wrist still stuck in Seokmin’s grasp until Mingyu gets a hold of it, making a grab for the other one before pulling Seungcheol up. 

Seungcheol doesn't mind playing ragdoll, especially when absolutely everything is being done for him. Draped over Mingyu’s arms, he shoves his nose into Mingyu’s shoulder comfortably and allows himself to doze off just to further numb that pain.

Luckily, he doesn’t need extra attention. He sleeps through the night and wakes in the morning beside Mingyu, who springs up the second that Seungcheol makes the smallest groan.

“Are you dying?” Mingyu whispers, his voice too loud for Seungcheol’s sensitive state.

“Yeah.”

“I’ll get you water.” 

Seungcheol rolls over, spreading himself out completely on his bed as the weight is shifted off of the mattress, footsteps growing lighter as they retreat into the other room. 

His head doesn’t really hurt anymore, he just feels a bit foggy and tired. He stretches out his arm over his head with a soft moan, smacking his lips as his hands fall over his eyes. He rubs at them with his palms, readying himself to look at the brightness of the world around him, and opens his eyes slowly. 

It takes a moment for him to fully blink the tiredness out of his vision, focusing on the cracks of light filtering through his fingers until he decides to prop himself up, looking around in a daze until his brain catches up with reality.

He looks down at his arm, not really looking for anything, to lock eyes with his timer. 

00:00:04:23:08

07….06...05….

Seungcheol blinks down blankly at his realization. Everything -- that weird ass dream, getting smacked in the face with a metal door -- it was completely real and now he’s staring at a timer and he’s got  _ four hours until he meets Joshua again.  _ That’s when he screams.

There’s a muffled “ _ shit! _ ” and a shatter of glass mere seconds before Mingyu’s heavy footsteps are nearing the bedroom again, and he flings himself against the doorway with the utmost amount of panic in his eyes. 

“Are you okay? Is anything broken?”

Seungcheol shakes his head and raises his arm like a fist of victory, showing off Joshua’s name and the timer imprinted there. 

“No! I’m not!” He smiles, nearly glowing. 

Mingyu sighs and settles against the doorway with a grin. 

“I’m glad you’re not broken.” His grin falls, and his teeth tug at his bottom lip, “Uh, one of your cups isn’t as fortunate.” 

Seungcheol falls back onto his bed, kicking at his sheets like a giddy child before settling completely still. All at once, he jolts up and flings himself out of bed. 

“I have no idea where he is!” 

Mingyu’s face morphs from nervous to absolutely crestfallen. He doesn’t know anything besides the lies that Seungcheol had to give his friends as to not reveal Joshua’s identity and not seem like a complete madman. To Mingyu, Joshua’s still a missing man, or perhaps one that just dropped off of the earth willingly. 

After a moment, Mingyu’s worry seems to fade into his usual neutral, which borders more on a natural happy glow than a bitch face. 

“Well, you have a timer, right? That means you’re bound to meet him no matter what. You just have to be at the right place at the right time.” Mingyu shrugs. “Let me see your wrist.” 

Seungcheol holds it out, studying Mingyu’s face like he’ll have a better thought process than he might. To his displeasure, Mingyu’s eyebrows furrow. 

“Hey, the timer is going backwards now.” 

“What?”

Sure enough, the timer began counting backwards when Seungcheol looked down to check. He felt his chest tighten.

“Ah! You’re not going fast enough!”

“Huh?” 

“You have to be at the right place at the right time! If you fuck it up, or you don’t do the right thing at the right time, it’s just gonna set back! That’s how mine was!” 

Seungcheol looks around in a panic, unsure of what the hell he needs to do, his hands flying to his head as the stress makes it feel like it’s going to expand until it explodes. 

“Go get ready! Go!” Mingyu urges. 

Seungcheol nearly trips over his own legs twice as he runs to his closet, and over to his bathroom, stripping himself of his shirt before flinging his face from the bathroom doorway. 

“Go get my car from the bar!” 

Mingyu nods, quickly gathering what he needs, and as he passes by the bathroom he gasps out a quick, “You owe me!” 

“Yeah, whatever! I’ll pay for the uber!” 

Seungcheol showers quickly. He noticed that the quicker he got ready, the more likely it was that his timer would continue counting down like normal. He continues to rush, getting himself as date-ready as he can. By the time Mingyu gets back, just barely pushing himself through the front door with a loud pant, Seungcheol abandons his half dried hair in favor of grabbing his phone and his wallet and getting the hell out of there. 

“I’ll drop you off at your place, come on." Seungcheol quickly grabs his keys from Mingyu’s loose grasp before running through the hallway of his complex down to his waiting car. 

Luckily, Mingyu’s place seems to be in the right direction. As he drives, he notices that sometimes the seconds stutter if he turns a certain street, or if he’s at a stoplight for too long. When they get to Mingyu’s place he practically kicks the other out of his car, but Mingyu doesn’t really seem to mind. The taller yells out a “good luck!” as Seungcheol drives away.

He drives for a while, stopping once to get gas, and keeps driving until the seconds seem like they’re going quicker. Before he realized it, three and a half hours turn to two and a half, and when he drives by the mall, it jumps down by two full hours. 

Thirty minutes. 

Seungcheol swerves into the parking lot and secures himself a place before getting out of his car. His initial thoughts are dread, wondering how the hell he’d find Joshua in the biggest outdoor mall in the city, but deep down he knows that it’s going to be okay. He’s determined to make it that way. 

Running past stores, checking his timer to gauge how close he is, he can’t stop thinking about everything that’s led him to this. Living the way he did, loving the way he has-- it led him to meeting Joshua for the first time. Or perhaps it was Joshua that sought him out first. It used to be his job, after all. But he doesn’t regret it. It doesn’t matter how many times he’s been hurt in the past or how many times he’s hurt himself-- he’s got someone he knows he’ll never hurt, and hopefully will do the same for him. That’s what a soulmate is supposed to be. Someone that destiny has gifted every person in the world to love irrevocably. 

Panting, he checks his timer. 

Two minutes. 

He looks around for a good half of a minute, scoping out the streets for Joshua. There’s a distinct lack of him, so Seungcheol turns the corner and looks where he’s in front of. 

Seungcheol bites his lip to hold back a smile, takes a deep breath to steady himself, and exhales once he's sure he's ready. In that moment, he doesn’t believe that he’ll be any more ready for anything that’s due to happen.

He runs his hand over his head, smoothing out his hair and straightening out his bangs before pushing his way through the glass doors. 

He knows this place well: the friendly baristas that yell a cheery welcome to everyone that comes in, the different shaped tables expected to give a sense of individuality, the potted plants hung up on shelves and glowing light bulbs strung from the ceiling that stay lit throughout the entire day. 

He scans through the familiar cafe, but doesn’t have to look as hard as he did outside. Sitting in the corner, at the round table pressed up against the blackboard wall, is the face that Seungcheol has been yearning to see for what feels like forever. He’s sitting there nervously, right hand fidgeting with the sleeve of his left arm, just lying there on the table as Joshua does his best to avoid eye contact with his timer. His bangs are overgrown, nearly poking into his eyes, but that just makes them look so much softer. 

Seven seconds.

Seungcheol decides to get moving, unwavering bravery as he walks toward Joshua. 

He can hear a quiet ticking, getting louder by the second until he’s standing in front of the table. Joshua flinches at the shadow and looks up. 

_ Ding _ !

Those doe eyes that Seungcheol loves widen, his petal-like lips parting as his adam’s apple bobs. He’s at a loss for words.

“G-Grocery store guy?” Joshua says, nearly whispering.

Seungcheol cringes, and all of his courage saps from his body with his spirit. He can feel it flying away, disintegrating into the air. Goodbye, hopes and dreams. It was nice having you for a few hours. 

No, now’s not the time for that. Now is the time for  _ love _ , goddamnit! But now he’s nervous.

“Um,” Seungcheol’s voice cracks, and his eyes dart around as he mentally grabs for any explanation. “I-I’m really sorry about that. I had a really convincing dream, uh, the night before, and, like, I was really convinced that you knew who I was but I wasn’t really completely awake, so, uh. If you want to see my I.D, you can, I’m totally not lying--”

“It’s fine, I believe you,” Joshua replies, his voice smoothing over all of Seungcheol’s fears. “I had a dream last night too. It was really vague, and I have no idea what any of it meant, but I woke up with this.” He holds up his wrist. “I just…”

Joshua stands slowly, his fingers still lingering on the table even as he’s at his full height. 

“Is it okay if I-- if I hug you?”

As Seungcheol spreads his arms, he feels like crying. Joshua easily comes forward, wrapping his arms firmly around Seungcheol’s middle. It takes all of Seungcheol’s mental strength to keep himself from squeezing the life out of Joshua, but it’s fine. He has his whole life to do that now. They linger in the hug for a few moments, and when Joshua pulls away, Seungcheol easily lets him go.

“Wow I just-- I can’t believe it.” Joshua rubs the side of his neck, a lopsided grin on his face as he allows a nervous chuckle to pass through his lips before he continues, “I’ve been waiting for this moment my whole life.”

Secretly, Seungcheol agrees.

Seven year old Seungcheol understands when his mom talks about soulmates, how she fondly refers to his father as her other half; her destiny. He daydreams about having a soulmate until he’s thirteen. Soon after that, his parents took him to a doctor, who had told him that he was likely a late bloomer; his symptoms wouldn’t show up until he was eighteen. Yet, after he had turned eighteen, there was nothing. No song in his head, no mark on his body -- there wasn’t anything. He became resentful, overlooked by the gods that promised happy fates and cherished romances. Over time, that resent faded into depression, which had transformed into a dull acceptance as he continued to age, as he continued to find love in lovers that could never give all of themselves to Seungcheol. Truthfully, Seungcheol never could, either.

The years of denial, the melancholic daydreams of finding his true other half that Seungcheol ignored and brushed off until he believed it, the months he spent in one-sided relationships or the months nursing wounds from real loving ones, it all feels like nothing. It's a new kind of relief that he’s never felt before, unbridled joy and serenity that he’s found his destined home. He’s got a place he can permanently keep his heart. He always had one. It makes him feel like he’s tangible, like he’s real, like he’s allowed to really be in love for the very first time.

Seungcheol smiles, folds his hands in his lap, and sighs.

“Me too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow i really finished a fic for the first time.. that's absolutely wild AND crazy................ but i really couldnt have pulled through and done it without the support of the people who read and kudos and comment and hype me up on twitter and just .. wow i really. it's nice to do something that really feels like it's enjoyed? by people??? i dont know it just means a lot to me that anybody would read this. i really do sincerely appreciate u, reader, for giving this fic a shot. i would also like to give an extra special shoutout to my best friend & beta for this fic prince, for allowing me to message them at 2 am like hey i finished my chapter what do u think about [insert list here]. u have always put up with me and my stupid requests and this fic would not be nearly as good without ur godly little eyes catching all of my little mistakes. i love u so much
> 
> well it is sad but i must bid this humble little fic adieu...... and one last time i'd really like to thank u for reading. 
> 
> <3 @bigcaratfool

**Author's Note:**

> welcome! this au is based off of a twitter post by @leaderunits on twitter! (link below)
> 
> https://twitter.com/leaderunits/status/1066904964658692096
> 
> it's funny but this little shitpost gave me an idea that i. could just. not. knock. out. of. my. brain. i sincerely hope you guys enjoy the ride i've planned ahead!! i think that going ahead there will be some questions so if you ever have any, just let me know!! :D 
> 
> thank you to my best friend for beta-ing this fic i owe you not only my life but the lives of Millions!!!!!!!!!!!


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